SOP for Multilingual Documentation and Retention Compliance

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Published on 21/12/2025

Multilingual Documentation and Retention Compliance SOP

Department	Clinical Research
SOP No.	CS/SWISS-DOC/193/2025
Supersedes	N.A.
Page No.	1 of 22
Issue Date	28/08/2025
Effective Date	05/09/2025
Review Date	05/09/2027

Table of Contents

Purpose

The purpose of this SOP is to establish clear processes for preparing multilingual documentation and ensuring compliance with Swiss retention rules for clinical trial records. It ensures ethical, regulatory, and scientific integrity by meeting Swissmedic, BASEC, and ICH GCP requirements.

Scope

This SOP applies to all clinical trials conducted in Switzerland. It covers the translation, certification, back-translation, submission, and archiving of essential trial documents such as informed consent forms, protocols, investigator brochures, patient materials, and safety reports. It applies to sponsors, investigators, CROs, regulatory affairs staff, and translation vendors.

Responsibilities

Sponsor: Ensures that all documents requiring translation are prepared in the required national languages and retained per retention rules.
Regulatory Affairs (RA): Submits multilingual documents to Swissmedic and BASEC and records acknowledgments.
Principal Investigator (PI): Provides subject-facing translated documents to participants and maintains ISF per retention timelines.
Translation Vendor: Supplies certified translations and ensures accuracy via back-translation.
Quality Assurance (QA): Audits translation processes and retention logs for compliance.

Accountability

The Sponsor’s Head of Clinical Operations is accountable for multilingual documentation compliance. The PI is accountable for ensuring subject-facing materials are accurate and archived correctly at site level.

Procedure

1. Identification of Required Translations

Determine which documents require translation based on trial location (German, French, Italian regions).
Document translation requirements in Translation Tracker (Annexure-1).

2. Translation and Verification

Engage certified medical translators for trial documents.
Perform back-translation for critical documents (ICFs, patient leaflets).
File Certificate of Translation in TMF.

3. Submission to Authorities

Submit translated documents to Swissmedic and BASEC through electronic portals.
Record approvals and acknowledgments in Submission Log (Annexure-2).

4. Retention Rules

Retain TMF and ISF documents for at least 10 years as per ClinO.
For device trials (ClinO-MD), retain for 15 years.
Ensure retention logs are updated annually.

5. Archiving

Archive records in secure physical or digital facilities with restricted access.
Backups must be maintained in a separate secure location.

Abbreviations

ClinO: Ordinance on Clinical Trials in Human Research
ClinO-MD: Ordinance on Clinical Trials with Medical Devices
Swissmedic: Swiss Agency for Therapeutic Products
BASEC: Business Administration System for Ethics Committees
ICF: Informed Consent Form
TMF: Trial Master File
ISF: Investigator Site File
RA: Regulatory Affairs
QA: Quality Assurance
PI: Principal Investigator

Documents

Translation Tracker (Annexure-1)
Submission Log (Annexure-2)
Retention Log (Annexure-3)

References

Version: 1.0

Approval

Prepared By	Checked By	Approved By
Name: Rajesh Kumar Date: 20/08/2025 Signature: __________	Name: Sunita Reddy Date: 22/08/2025 Signature: __________	Name: Dr. Meera Iyer Date: 28/08/2025 Signature: __________

Annexures

Annexure-1: Translation Tracker

Document	Language	Translator	Date	Status
ICF v1.0	French	Maria Steiner	05/08/2025	Certified

Annexure-2: Submission Log

Date	Protocol No.	Document	Submitted To	Status
12/08/2025	CH-2025-01	French ICF	BASEC	Approved

Annexure-3: Retention Log

Protocol No.	Document Type	Retention Period	Archive Location	Owner
CH-2025-01	TMF	10 years	Zurich Facility	Neha Sharma

Revision History

Revision Date	Revision No.	Revision Details	Reason for Revision	Approved By
28/08/2025	1.0	Initial SOP for multilingual documentation and retention compliance.	New SOP created for Swiss ClinO and BASEC compliance.	Head of Clinical Research

For more SOPs visit: Pharma SOP.