Medical transcription outsourcing: Providing services with verifiable results

Medical transcription has been providing valuable documentation support to the healthcare sector by helping create legible, detailed and accurate patient medical records. Healthcare as a process depends on information from patient medical records to be able to function effectively in terms of providing quality care and in handling the commercial aspects. Though there are many options available to healthcare professionals and healthcare facilities to document the patient encounter, outsourced medical transcription services is one option that provides verifiable results.

Medical transcription is the process of listening to the dictation of healthcare professionals regarding the patient encounter and transcribing the same into text format. This process of creating patient medical records lends itself to producing patient medical records which has verifiable results, against criteria such as:

• Accuracy: Accuracy of the information captured in the patient medical record is probably one of the most important factors that affect the operations of healthcare facilities at many levels. The information in the patient medical record needs to be accurate to facilitate provision of quality care, as a defense against litigation and for the purpose of coding & billing. Accuracy of the information captured needs to be as close to 100% as possible and can be measured by assigning different values for different error categories. The capacity of the medical transcription company to delivery accurate transcription services can be measured by verifying their training processes and quality processes.

• Turnaround time: Apart from the accuracy of information one of the other factors that affect the process of care, the reimbursement process and risk management is turnaround time. Usually medical transcription companies offer varied turnaround time options like 24 hours turnaround time for normal reports and 4-12 hours for STAT reports. The capability of the medical transcription company to meet turnaround time commitments can be measured by the availability of skilled medical transcriptionists with the service provider and the technology used by the medical transcription company

• Security: The need for preserving the confidentiality of patient information is underlined throughout the healthcare process and the importance of security during the medical transcription process is magnified due to the very nature of the service. Medical transcription service providers ensure data security during this process by incorporating security measures like 128-bit data encryption, multi-tiered application architecture, design level security, safeguards, firewall protected networks, sterilized e-mail servers, denial of access procedure and multi modal alerts. Measures are also taken to ensure security by ensuring that the data doesn’t leave their premises physically and educating their team on the importance of HIPAA and HITECH compliance throughout the transcription process.

• Cost: One of the main benefits of outsourcing medical transcription is the cost savings. The cost savings made by the healthcare facility/ healthcare professional can be verified by comparing the cost of in-house transcription with that of the cost per line charged by the medical transcription company. The verification of cost can also be done by evaluating the billing method to ensure it is verifiable, measurable, definable, consistent, fair and honest.

• Technology: Technology has a large role to play in the medical transcription process – making the process quicker, easy to use and secure. The role of technology in the medical transcription process can be evaluated by assessing the benefits provided by technology like dictation modes, delivery modes and HL7 interface and by ensuring that all the software and tools used by the medical transcription company are easy to use.

It can be concluded that medical transcription is a process that provides services with verifiable results.

TransDyne, a leader in the outsourced medical transcription industry has used their extensive background in information technology and their experience in serving the needs of the healthcare sector to provide affordable and integrated medical transcription solutions.

TransDyne offers quality medical transcription at reasonable prices, executed by experienced and qualified medical transcriptionists with a very quick turnaround time executed through secure HIPAA and HITECH compliant channels, with very high levels of accuracy and all this with technology that is advanced but easy to use!

To avail complete medical transcription services from TransDyne, click here.