MAVRO’s developer obviously doesn’t understand the idea of idiom. An idiom is a combination of words that has a particular meaning when used together. In English, we are accustomed to the idea that pain comes and goes, or that it moves or travels. Spanish has no such idioms.

Here are some more examples of MAVRO’s bad Spanish.

EXAMPLE FOUR:

“Does the pain come and go?”

MAVRO translation:

“El dolor va y viene?”

What MAVRO is actually saying in Spanish is complete nonsense and would only be understood by a Spanish speaker who also understands English, which is not the point of the app. In Spanish, you say that pain diminishes and intensifies, not that it comes and goes. The verbs to use with dolor (Spanish for pain) are disminuir and agudizar.

EXAMPLE FIVE:

“Point to where the pain travels.”

MAVRO translation:

“Apunte hacia donde se va el dolor.”

Once again, this sounds ridiculous to a Spanish speaker because Spanish has no idiom that conveys the idea that pain travels. Yet MAVRO has translated “travel” literally using the verb irse, which means, “to leave” or “to go away”. Furthermore, the verb “apuntar” (for which “apunte” is the command form) means “to point or aim” such as with a weapon or gun. Apuntar is not used in a more general sense to mean, to point. The correct verb to use when asking somebody to point to a source of pain would be “indicar,” which is obviously cognate to “indicate” in English, but doesn’t sound formal in Spanish the way it does in English.

I think it’s a crime for MAVRO to be representing to doctors and other emergency medical personnel that this app provides a good Spanish resource.

EXAMPLE ONE:

“Is your vision blurred?”

MAVRO translation:

“Tiene la vista borrosa o nublada?”

What the MAVRO translation says:

“Is your view blurry or cloudy?”

The mistake that MAVRO makes, probably because they used a machine translation program, is that vista means view, not vision.

Here is how you would say it properly in Spanish:

¿Tiene usted visión borrosa o nublada?

EXAMPLE TWO:

“Shrug your shoulders.”

MAVRO translation:

“Encoja sus hombros.”

What the MAVRO translation says:

“Cripple your shoulders.”

The mistake that MAVRO makes, and this is critical for medical professionals to understand, is that when you refer to the body, you often use reflexive verb forms.

Here is how you would say it properly in Spanish:

“Encójase los hombros.”

EXAMPLE THREE:

“When was your last bowel movement?”

MAVRO translation:

Cuando fue la ultima vez que defeco?

What the MAVRO translation says:

When was the last time that I defecate?

Here is how to say it properly in Spanish.

¿Cuándo fue la última vez que defecó?

What’s missing in MAVRO’s Spanish is the accent marks, and in Spanish they completely change the meaning of what has been said. In Spanish, the word defeco would normally be pronounced with stress on the second to last syllable. This means “I defecate.” (By Spanish spelling rules it is actually spelled defequo.) However, the accent mark causes the stress to be moved to the last syllable, change the tense to the past tense so that it means “you defecated” (formal you) or “he/she defecated.”

Perhaps MAVRO omitted accent marks because it was originally written using some kind of app development system that does not allow accents and diacritical marks. The result is very bad Spanish, because accents often change the meaning of words.

Not only is the Spanish bad, but MAVRO has obviously manipulated all of the ratings systems by using a vast number of sock puppet accounts to submit phony rave reviews of its applications. Pardon my French, but this company and its Spanish language app is a pile of mierda.

With Medical Spanish, you definitely need a fundamental understanding of how to pronounce words in Spanish – so if you’ve ever taken a Spanish class that’s pretty much all you need and you’re set to use the app in nearly any clinical situation.

Although I have to admit the mavro app has an interesting array of colors.

Thanks for the review.

Dr. D

First off, thanks for posting. I was looking at Marvo in the App store and I think I’ll give it a try soon. It seems like it would be particularly useful in the acute setting. Is it good with history taking? And do you know if it has a search function?