Medical Spanish

[comet2sixty]

Hey everyone! I have had some experience that have really inspired me to learn medical Spanish. Has anyone had any experience with Canopy? Should I start with Rosetta Stone or something like that? For reference, I grew up in Miami and have been around Spanish all my life and know some words, but never took it in high school or college, cant really speak it.

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[evasive fish]

It´s great that you´re interested in medical Spanish!

The best thing to do in your situation would be to learn and practice Spanish in general to the best of your ability - not just limiting yourself to learning medically-relevant terms. That way, you´ll have a much better communication with your patients and avoid potential confusions/misunderstandings that could hinder an accurate diagnosis or lead the patients to do things they shouldn't.

 

[Blueprint Med School]

Hey everyone! I have had some experience that have really inspired me to learn medical Spanish. Has anyone had any experience with Canopy? Should I start with Rosetta Stone or something like that? For reference, I grew up in Miami and have been around Spanish all my life and know some words, but never took it in high school or college, cant really speak it.

Canopy was part of my 4th year medical Spanish course and I thought it was pretty... meh. I thought Rosetta Stone was better but they all suffer from the same issue online language software suffers from, and it is live one on one that actually moves the needle when acquiring language. I believe RS has those sessions, which makes it helpful, but it comes at a cost.

For those on a budget, grab a tutor off of Wyzant for speaking and get Barbara Bregstein's Step by Step for grammar.

David D, MD - USMLE and MCAT Tutor
Med School Tutors

 

[comet2sixty]

Canopy was part of my 4th year medical Spanish course and I thought it was pretty... meh. I thought Rosetta Stone was better but they all suffer from the same issue online language software suffers from, and it is live one on one that actually moves the needle when acquiring language. I believe RS has those sessions, which makes it helpful, but it comes at a cost.

For those on a budget, grab a tutor off of Wyzant for speaking and get Barbara Bregstein's Step by Step for grammar.

David D, MD - USMLE and MCAT Tutor
Med School Tutors

My roommate speaks Spanish as his first language, so he agreed to help me practice and become more of a natural speaker. This is absolutely my goal, over than purely understanding medical terms. I want to be able to relate to my patients. I'm specifically interested in Oncology, and that patient physician relationship is very important. Do you think canopy for the medical stuff and practice with my roommate is enough, or should I try to seek private face to face lessons?

 

[lull]

I actually have a similar question with that too. Do you actually need to be credentialed in some way to use Spanish in practice if you are not a native? I saw that canopy has some sort of certification process, but I don't see the value of paying that much when you could learn medical vocab using something like memrise or premade anki cards.