Computer Speech Project to Boost Doctor-Patient Communication

A program funded by USC’s Clinical Translational Science Institute is helping create a computerized speech translation system to be used in clinics and hospitals to bolster communication between physicians and patients.

Led by Shrikanth Narayanan of the USC Veterbi School of Engineering, the SpeechLinks Project team includes two researchers from the Keck School of Medicine, professors Win May and Lourdes Baezconde-Garbanati. SpeechLinks, a speech-to-speech translation system for clinics and hospitals, is designed to translate between English and Spanish. In practice, a doctor and patient are connected by two headsets to a computer that performs the translation in near real time.

The system is designed to learn from its encounters, referring tougher translation problems to a human translator who can review the entire conversation and fill in the gaps where the machine is having trouble translating. The doctor may also elect to refer the conversation to a human translator if necessary.

While their colleagues at the Veterbi School develop the technical infrastructure for the system, May and Baezconde-Garbanati draw on their medical and cultural experience to develop test cases with which to “train” the system. As May notes, “In translation, if you don’t understand the cultural context, the translation may not be as effective as you want it to be.”

Baezconde-Garbanati described their role as developing “alternative culturally relevant scenarios,” to test the system, including “important cultural values and variations in cases and disease conditions.” As she explained, this is the first study of its kind in the United States—one that deals with the Spanish-speaking population. In developing, the Spanish vocabulary of the system, they are attempting to build a “culturally intelligent” tool.

Both hope that this system can help assist overburdened interpreters in public health systems like Los Angeles County’s, or in remote areas without access to interpreters. Baezconde-Garbanati, who studies the role of culture in health behaviors, said, “Competent current interpreters are maxed out in terms of demand. Leaving simultaneous interpretation to family members, janitors in the hallway, or children is a thing of the past. . . [SpeechLinks] could help them make decisions regarding where to send their prescious resources.”

Written by Joe Peters for “The Weekly.”