Medicine Simplifier (The Polyglot Pharmacist)

Bridging the gap between complex medical jargon and patient safety—in any language.

What is this?

The Medicine Instruction Simplifier is an AI-powered Apify Actor designed to prevent medication errors among non-native speakers, the elderly, and travelers.

It takes a medicine name (in any language/script) and returns a simple, bulleted safety guide in the patient's native language.

Always consult your doctor first, before taking any medicine!

Key Features

• Universal Input: Accepts medicine names written in most common languages and scripts. (e.g., ロキソプロフェン, Doliprane, Paracetamol).
• Hybrid AI Engine:
  • Gemini 2.5 Flash: Normalizes foreign drug names, performs deep analysis, and summarizes complex text.
  • Lingo.dev: Provides highly accurate, localized translations of the final instructions.
• Transparent Sources: Returns the direct URL to the medical data source used, ensuring trust and verifiability.
• Phonetic Pronunciation (FR/DE/ES): Adds human-readable phonetic guidance for medicine names where helpful.
• Automatic Safety Flags: Instantly detects critical risks like:
  • Take with food
  • Avoid alcohol
  • Pregnancy risks
  • Drowsiness warnings
• Fault Tolerant: Includes robust error reporting. If one part fails (e.g., translation), the actor still delivers the partial data it successfully retrieved.

How It Works

1. Input: User enters a medicine name (e.g., "バファリン") and target language (e.g., "Hindi").
2. Normalization: Gemini identifies the standard English generic name (e.g., "Aspirin").
3. Search Scan: The Actor searches trusted public medical databases (e.g., Drugs.com).
4. Summarization: Gemini extracts dosage and safety info, formatting it into a clean list.
5. Localization: Lingo.dev translates the summary and the medicine name back into the target language.

Input Parameters

Field	Type	Description	Default
medicine_name	str	The name of the medicine in ANY language (generic names preferred for best accuracy).	Doliprane
target_language	str	The language for the output instructions (English, French, Hindi, Japanese, etc.).	English
gemini_api_key	str	Your Google Gemini API Key (Free tier available).	Required
lingo_api_key	str	Your Lingo.dev API Key.	Required

Current language support:

Language	ISO 639-1 Code
English	en
Spanish	es
French	fr
German	de
Japanese	ja
Chinese	zh
Hindi	hi

How to Use?

Step 1: Get your API keys:

1. Visit Lingo.dev and Gemini API Key
2. Sign up/ Sign in
3. Go to Developer Dashboard and get your API Keys

Step 2: Translation

1. Enter your medicine name
2. Select your desired language
3. Enter your Gemini API Key
4. Enter your Lingo.dev API Key

Step 3: Run!

• Run the actor and receive instructions in your desired language.

Sample Output (JSON)

Here is an example of a Japanese user searching for "Advil" (Ibuprofen):

{
  "input_medicine": "Advil",
  "medicine_translated": "イブプロフェン",
  "patient_language": "Japanese",
  "translated_instructions": [
    "痛みや熱のために必要に応じて4〜6時間ごとに1錠（200mg）を服用してください。",
    "胃の不調を防ぐために、食べ物や牛乳と一緒に服用してください。",
    "医師の指示がない限り、24時間以内に6錠（1200mg）を超えて服用しないでください。",
    "アスピリンや他のNSAIDにアレルギーがある場合は使用しないでください。"
  ],
  "important_disclaimer": "免責事項：AIは誤る可能性があります。医師に相談してください.",
  "safety_flags": {
    "take_with_food": true,
    "avoid_alcohol": true,
    "may_cause_drowsiness": false,
    "pregnancy_warning": true
  },
  "source_url": "[https://www.drugs.com/advil.html](https://www.drugs.com/advil.html)",
  "error_report": []
}

Use Cases:

1. Simplifies complex medical data: Converts dense technical text from Drugs.com into five clear, easy-to-understand dosage steps for patients.

2. Overcomes language barriers: Uses Lingo.dev to accurately localize medicine names (translation or transliteration as appropriate) and translate instructions into languages like Hindi or Japanese.

3. Identifies critical risks: Automatically extracts and flags vital safety warnings like alcohol restrictions or pregnancy hazards via Gemini.

4. Enables health tech integration: Delivers structured, verified JSON data for developers building telemedicine apps, chatbots, or digital pill dispensers.

Limitations

• Information is sourced from publicly available medical databases and may vary by country.
• Dosage recommendations are general and not personalized.
• The actor does not replace professional medical advice.

Disclaimer:

Please use generic medicine names when searching to ensure the most accurate results. Brand names may lead to mismatched or incomplete instructions, as the database primarily indexes medications under their generic names rather than brand names.

However, the system will still attempt to retrieve relevant information by also searching for the corresponding brand name.

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