Borås Stad uses Care to Translate to bridge language barriers in community psychiatry and supported housing. A secure, GDPR-compliant alternative has improved safety, reduced misunderstandings, saved staff time, and lowered compliance risks.
Borås Stad uses Care to Translate to overcome language barriers in community psychiatry and supported housing. By replacing uncontrolled translation tools with a secure, GDPR-compliant solution, the municipality has strengthened care-recipient safety, reduced misunderstandings, saved valuable staff time, and avoided the risks of non-compliant digital tools.
Borås Stad is one of West Sweden’s largest municipalities, serving around 115,000 residents. The Sociala omsorgsförvaltningen and Vård- och äldreförvaltningen are responsible for a wide range of services including community psychiatry, supported housing, and elderly care.
Andreas Plotzki, ICT Coordinator, has worked in the municipality for more than two decades and today leads the implementation of digital tools across services.
Several units in Borås Stad supported residents who did not speak Swedish – some spoke only Arabic or Chinese. Staff had been relying on non-compliant tools such as Google Translate and ChatGPT to communicate.
As Andreas explains, this created serious challenges:
“It doesn’t feel good that these kinds of tools are being used in the organization.”
Not only were these tools unpredictable in translation quality (risking safety in care-critical situations), they also put the municipality at risk of GDPR violations. Staff still needed to communicate and without an approved tool they would continue using non-compliant alternatives.
This created three core challenges:
Staff relied on body language or asked colleagues or relatives for help – taking extra time and increasing the risk of misunderstandings.
Using open tools meant no control over data handling, storage, or accuracy.
“You can be sure of one thing: the organization isn’t going to stop using tools that help them – not even if a Data Protection Officer says no. That’s why we wanted to make this transition happen quickly.”
Miscommunication could lead to incorrect care routines, misunderstandings in medication, or unsafe day-to-day interactions.
The municipality needed a safe, compliant and fast solution, without adding heavy administrative burden or lengthy procurement processes.
When the need became clear, Borås Stad decided to act immediately.
Andreas explains how quickly it went:
“It didn’t take more than a week before we had onboarded four superusers – and then they were on track.”
The team formed a small group of superusers, onboarded them through a quick training session with Care to Translate, and rolled out the tool to two units as a first pilot.
“All I had to do was send over a few email addresses – Care to Translate took care of the rest.”
The municipality highlighted two main reasons for moving quickly:
“With Care to Translate, there’s no way to track who said what. Nothing is recorded and nothing is saved.”
Superusers created tailored lists of phrases for their units – one for an Arabic-speaking resident and another for a Chinese-speaking resident.
“Care to Translate has a broad range of phrases in the library that are specifically tailored to these situations.”
Staff quickly began using the app for:
Andreas emphasizes the effect on the work environment:
“We’ve broadened the ways we can communicate. It’s frustrating when you’re forced to speak through just one person in a whole work group.”
Replacing uncontrolled tools with validated translations significantly reduced miscommunication in daily care. Staff can now ask crucial questions directly and safely.
“It’s important that we have quality-assured phrases, and not just an AI hallucinating responses.”
Both units saw immediate improvements:
“It took just a week after the pilot started, and now I have other departments knocking on my door wanting to use the tool.”
By centralizing translation in one secure tool, the municipality avoided:
And, importantly, the tool became an immediate alternative to uncontrolled translation apps, reducing IT risk and cost simultaneously.
Staff who themselves did not speak Swedish fluently could communicate more confidently:
“We have several staff members who aren’t native Swedish speakers, and none of them have had any trouble learning the app.”
So in general, what is Andreas advice for organizations wanting to try the app out?
“Don’t be afraid to try it. Download the app on a few phones and let the staff test it.”
Curious about testing Care to Translate in municipal care? Implementations like Borås Stad show that a safe, compliant rollout can be done in just days, delivering measurable improvements in safety, cost, and efficiency.
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