Abstract
The main objective of this paper is to study mediation aspects in health communication, particularly in the field of HPV (Human Papilloma Virus) vaccination in three countries: the Netherlands, Germany and Italy. As an additional research question we will try to understand the extent to which medical translation and medical writing can be integrated, in the perspective of a greater recognition of the translators’ role as knowledge managers. After comparing the quality level of public service communication in the three countries, we will discuss outcome and social-political conditions of the HPV campaigns. Considering the growing importance of communication professionals in institutional health settings, we will explore possible implications for the social role of medical translators and raise the question of the extent to which translators of medical information material may be allowed to stretch the boundaries of translation and operate more far-reaching choices concerning medical writing. The relevance of this study is to gain insight into health communication in three different language communities and to consider implications for medical translator practice and training.
Highlights
In this paper we discuss general parameters of health communication as evidenced by the HPV (Human Papilloma Virus) vaccination campaigns, introduced in the Netherlands, Germany and Italy at approximately the same time
We will explore the factors that have determined the different success rates of the immunization campaigns in the three countries: in the Netherlands, a relatively low success rate that slightly improved thanks to a better tailored follow-up campaign; in Germany, an initially high attendance rate followed by a significant drop; in Italy, campaigns that had good scores from the onset but showed strong interregional differences
Accessible public information is a popular research item investigated within the framework of applied linguistics on “key populations” (Hall, Smith, & Wicaksono, 2011, pp. 52–75)
Summary
In this paper we discuss general parameters of health communication as evidenced by the HPV (Human Papilloma Virus) vaccination campaigns, introduced in the Netherlands, Germany and Italy at approximately the same time. The language planning efforts undertaken for fostering access to public services appear to be on different levels: compared to the Netherlands, in Italy and Germany awareness among public service providers of the existence of key populations with different profiles and needs is a more recent development, dating back to the 1990s Of the latter two countries, Germany seems to have gained ground more quickly, at least in the private sector. In order to meet the rapidly changing requirements in today’s health sector, the translator might be called on to perform higher order skills of textual and discourse competence, with increasing use of genre-based competences In this perspective, translators act more as knowledge managers, applying their knowledge to deal with complex intercultural situations and thereby generating intellectual capital Translators act more as knowledge managers, applying their knowledge to deal with complex intercultural situations and thereby generating intellectual capital (Risku, Dickinson, & Pircher, 2010, pp. 88–89)
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