Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Medical transcription outsourcing: Serving the opposing needs of the healthcare sector

The healthcare sector is poised on the verge of a major change in the way the healthcare process is documented and shared. Medical transcription - the process of creating textual patient medical records from the dictation of the healthcare professionals detailing the patient encounter, has been the subject of many discussions in this context. Introduction of newer options and newer technologies has resulted in the role of medical transcription being questioned.

However dealing with the practicalities of the implementation of these newer methods has proven that medical transcription is and will remain an integral part of the healthcare documentation scenario as it meets the needs of all the participants in the healthcare process. Moreover outsourcing medical transcription increases the efficiency and cost effectiveness of these services.

Medical transcription services provide documentation support that serves the following needs:

Fast and easy way to capture information: Medical transcription is one method of documenting the healthcare process that requires minimum adjustment in the way healthcare professionals work. Medical transcription companies encourage dictation as the means of collecting data as opposed to self-entry by healthcare professionals. This offers convenience to healthcare professionals in terms of using dictation devices of their choice; dictating as per their time constraints and helping them focus entirely on the patient. Medical transcription companies also offer editing and proofreading services for transcripts created by backend speech recognition software saving healthcare professionals’ time spent on editing the transcripts themselves to bring it to acceptable levels.

Easy convertibility to structured and encoded data: Medical transcription services are not only the most preferred methods of documenting the care process, but they also offer options to convert this information to structured data that can be parsed into the EMR/ EHR. Medical transcription companies offer options like structured transcription, structured dictation, discrete reportable transcription and HL7 interface to enable this. This meets the needs for administrators, coders and billing professionals etc.

Providing content and context: Healthcare professionals have found that using point and click templates often leave them with data that does not tell them the complete story. Documenting the patient encounter using medical transcription services helps provide both rich content along with the context leading to the final diagnosis. This is essential not only for healthcare professionals and support staff but also plays a vital role in risk management.

Easy interpretation for communication: The patient medical records are not only used and accessed by the primary healthcare professional but could also be used for referrals to specialists etc. Patient medical records created using medical transcription services enable easy interpretation that facilitates communication. This is useful for managing care at all levels.

Collaboration with all the participants: Creating legible, comprehensive, clear and complete patient medical records ensure that all the participants in the healthcare process are on the same page including the patient. Medical transcription services ensure that the quality of information in patient medical records meet all these criteria.

Outsourcing medical transcription not only meets essential criteria like accuracy, turnaround time, security and pricing but also fulfills the often opposing needs of all the participants in healthcare process including healthcare professionals, support staff, administrators, risk managers, payers, researchers, public health officials and the patient by creating quality documentation on time.

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.

Among the software and tools offered by TransDyne for transcription, the smart delivery system has a large role to play in easing the path to EMR/EHR adoption The Smart Delivery system, which has features like User defined folder paths to enable easy imports to EMR systems is the suggested mode of document delivery where pre-defined file saving would help import documents to EMR systems.  Apart from this TransDyne also offers discounted rates for those healthcare facilities that provide demographic data entered in the EMR rather than through other modes.

Along with medical transcription services involving multiple level quality checks to ensure accuracy, the use of the right technology for ease of use, turnaround time and security, at reasonable rates, TransDyne also provides discrete reportable transcription and editing & proofreading services for adoption of EMR/ EHR. 

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

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