We provide linguistic validation services in Bulgarian and all other Balkan languages to ensure that when your clinical trial, health outcome or experience questionnaire is translated, it will be clearly understood by those we interview.

Linguistic validation involves a meticulous multi-step process to assess a translation for clarity, intelligibility, appropriateness and cultural relevance.

To create the most accurate translations, two independent translators translate the questionnaire. Once the translations are complete, a reconciled version is created which unifies the two translations.

The next step in the process is back translation, which is done by a third independent translator who translates the reconciled version back into English to check its accuracy. From this process a final corrected translation is generated and reviewed by the relevant Balkan clinical staff.

Harmonization is an additional tool that may be used to provide consistency and uniformity if the project includes a number of different language translations. This ensures that the vocabulary and structure across all translations is consistent.

The questionnaire may need to be culturally adapted and then the translation must be linguistically validated.

Finally, the clinical trial questionnaire goes through cognitive debriefing to complete the linguistic validation process.

How the cognitive debriefing works

As the final step in the process, one of our linguistic validation consultants will use the translated questionnaire to conduct cognitive debriefing interviews in your target Balkan language with 5 to 10 patients or healthy subjects. This is to assess whether the questionnaire is straightforward and easy to read.

Our professional linguistic validation services guarantee that you are able to gather accurate and relevant data from patients or trial subjects.