Frequently Asked Questions

MyVaak is a browser-based tool that speaks structured first-contact clinical intake questions aloud in a patient's own language. The patient answers yes or no, and a formatted clinical note builds in real time, ready to copy into your patient management system. Nothing to install, and no patient data is stored on any server.

Whoever greets the patient first. That's GP reception, Health Care Assistants, nurses, urgent care and after-hours staff, ambulance crews, emergency departments, rural clinics, aged care, prison health and refugee services. MyVaak is not a GP-only tool - it's built for the first minutes of contact, wherever those happen.

No. The structure lives in the tool, not in the person holding the device. Clinical judgement stays exactly where it belongs, with the clinician - MyVaak just makes sure the right questions get asked, in a language the patient understands, before that judgement is applied.

Any practice tablet, phone or PC with a modern browser - open myvaak.co.nz and go. There is no app to install, no software to procure, and no IT sign-off required, because no patient data ever leaves the browser to create a data-liability question in the first place.

Yes, to load the page and audio the first time. We recommend testing on your clinic's actual devices, since some languages use the device's built-in text-to-speech rather than a pre-recorded voice, and that can behave slightly differently offline or on older browsers.

Around three to five minutes for the full 29-question assessment, spoken consent included. The sample note on this page (see "What does the finished clinical note actually look like?" below) was generated from a session that ran 4 minutes 22 seconds.

The question set is built on ABCDE assessment principles (Airway, Breathing, Circulation, Disability, Exposure) - standard training in NZ general practice and emergency nursing - and draws on elements of established structured triage protocols, including Schmitt-Thompson-style frameworks used in nurse triage lines internationally. MyVaak is not affiliated with, and does not claim to reproduce, any specific licensed triage product. Full detail is on the Clinical Framework page.

No, and it isn't trying to. MyVaak removes the cost and the wait of booking an interpreter for structured first-contact assessment specifically. For complex consultations, informed consent for procedures, or mental health assessment, a qualified interpreter is still the right call, and MyVaak's own disclaimer says so directly.

No. MyVaak has not been assessed, certified or approved as a medical device by Medsafe or any equivalent authority, and is not classified or registered under the Medicines Act 1981 or any equivalent legislation. It is a software communication aid, not a diagnostic or treatment tool.

It's in progress, not finished. A Clinical Advisory Panel of GPs is currently reviewing the question set as MyVaak scales, and that review isn't complete yet. The question design itself is informed by published research on language barriers in primary care, including Divi et al. (2007, Joint Commission) and Wearn et al. (2007, NZ Medical Journal). We'd rather say where the review stands honestly than imply it's finished when it isn't.

Ajit Kumar Nair, founder of MyMate Limited (Auckland). He is not a clinician - MyVaak grew out of watching family and friends struggle to be understood at the doctor, built on 11+ years at the Ministry of Social Development, 5+ years at MBIE in accessibility and public-service UX, and 35+ years in design and web development. That non-clinical origin is exactly why the Clinical Advisory Panel review matters, and why clinician feedback is actively sought rather than treated as a formality.

For an immediate life-threatening emergency, call 111 - MyVaak is a first-contact triage aid, not a resuscitation tool. It's also not appropriate for a mental health crisis or acute psychiatric presentation, for informed consent before a procedure, for a patient who is severely distressed, cognitively impaired or unresponsive, or generally for children under 10, who may not reliably respond to a yes/no format. Arrange a qualified interpreter in each of those situations.

The Health and Disability Commissioner's Code of Rights gives every patient in New Zealand the right to effective communication in a language they understand. MyVaak's first question every session is spoken consent in the patient's own language, documented directly in the clinical note - a stronger, more consistent compliance record than an undocumented phone or family-member exchange.

Repeat it, check the device volume, and confirm the correct language is selected. MyVaak displays the question text on screen alongside the audio, so a bilingual person present at the consultation can also read it aloud if needed. Voice quality varies between devices and languages, since some rely on the device's built-in text-to-speech rather than a human recording - testing on your own clinic devices in advance is worthwhile.

28 languages are live now, with more being added regularly. "Live" means real recorded audio exists for that language; languages awaiting recording still show on the site as coming soon.

MyVaak delivers audio primarily through high-quality human voice recordings. Where a recording isn't available yet, it falls back to your device's built-in text-to-speech engine. Naturalness and accent vary by device and operating system when the fallback is in use.

Yes - email info@myvaak.co.nz and let us know which language your patient community needs. Voice volunteers are especially welcome, since human-recorded audio is what MyVaak prioritises over the text-to-speech fallback.

As far as possible, but there are limits worth knowing about. Indian languages in particular carry significant regional and dialectal variation, and a question rendered accurately in standard Hindi may be unfamiliar to a speaker of a regional dialect. If a translation seems imprecise, email info@myvaak.co.nz - we want to know.

Yes. MyVaak is built for Aotearoa's communities across Te Reo Māori, Pacific, South Asian, Southeast Asian, East Asian and Middle Eastern languages.

Nowhere but the browser. Every piece of information entered during a session - patient name, date of birth, answers, the generated note - lives only in the device's sessionStorage and is automatically erased the moment the tab closes. Nothing is transmitted to or recoverable from MyVaak's servers, not by MyMate Limited and not by anyone.

The session data is gone - that's by design, not a bug. If you need to retain the clinical note, print it or copy it into your patient management system before closing the tab. Once the tab closes, nobody can recover it, including us.

No. MyVaak sets no cookie, records no IP address in any form, and uses no visitor identifier or device fingerprint for anyone using the assessment tool itself. Patients never log in and are never identifiable in any record MyVaak keeps.

Separately from the assessment tool, we count visits to public marketing pages - page name, date and time, referring site, and a broad device category such as mobile or desktop. No IP address, no cookie, no identifier - so we can't tell whether two page views came from the same person. Records are deleted automatically after 12 months. The assessment screens themselves are never counted.

MyVaak was built with privacy as a structural constraint rather than an afterthought - patient data never touches our servers by design. We operate in line with the Privacy Act 2020, the Health Information Privacy Code 2020, the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 and the Fair Trading Act 1986.

A flat $1,999 NZD per year, per practice. That covers every clinician, every language, and unlimited assessments - there's no per-assessment fee and no seat limit. Your first licence period runs 13 months before it renews annually at the same rate.

Everything is included in the one annual fee: all clinicians, all languages, unlimited assessments, one invoice. There's no IT sign-off cost, no procurement process, and no separate integration fee - a formatted note copies straight into Medtech, BestPractice, or any clinical system you already use.

Yes - the Founding Practice Programme currently has 5 of 5 places left, offering 3 months of full access at no cost to NZ general practices, urgent care and after-hours clinics. No card required to apply.

Nothing automatic - no card is taken to start, and there's no auto-charge at the end. If MyVaak has earned its place in your practice, you subscribe at the standard $1,999/year rate, and as a founding practice your first licence runs 15 months instead of 13. If it hasn't earned its place, that's a fine outcome too - you've helped make it better either way.

Yes - standard licences come with a 30-day money-back guarantee. Your statutory rights under the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 apply regardless.

Email info@myvaak.co.nz any time and we'll process it. Your licence stays active until the end of the current paid period; it just won't renew.

A structured summary with the language used, timestamp, spoken consent status, urgent findings highlighted at the top, notable findings, and every other recorded response - formatted consistently every session, ready to copy into your patient management system.

One tap to print or email the finished note, then copy it into Medtech, BestPractice, or whatever clinical system your practice already runs. There's no direct API integration - the note is designed to be pasted in cleanly, not to require one.

Yes - the $1,999/year licence covers the whole practice: every clinician, every language, unlimited assessments, on any of your devices. There's no per-seat charge to worry about.

Yes - once your practice has an account, log in to your practice dashboard to see your own usage: how many assessments, in which languages, over time. You can also export your data as a CSV. Each practice only ever sees its own data, never another practice's.

The question design draws on published, peer-reviewed research - including Flores et al. on interpreter error rates, Divi et al. on adverse events in patients with limited English proficiency, and Wearn et al. on language difficulties reported by Auckland GPs - and on established ABCDE and structured-triage frameworks. MyVaak itself is still early-stage: the Founding Practice pilot is generating real-world usage data now, and we're actively open to independent research or evaluation partnerships to assess it properly rather than rely on our own read of it.

We'd welcome that conversation. If your organisation works with practices, clinicians, or communities MyVaak is built for, email info@myvaak.co.nz - whether that's a demo for your team, a mention worth sharing with your network, or a more formal collaboration.

Founder Ajit Kumar Nair directly, via info@myvaak.co.nz. For general enquiries, the same address reaches the team.