Voice Recognition And Medical Transcription
You've probably heard different opinions and views on this
subject. If you're a medical transcriptionist you may even be
concerned about voice recognition taking over your career... and
you're not alone.
Let's dig a bit deeper into voice recognition.
As you already know, doctors are busy people. This is never more
obvious then when they're dictating their notes. It's
understandable they're busy, and as their MT, I can surely
forgive them but will the latest voice recognition software be
as forgiving as me?
Not likely.
As a transcriptionist you will have typed through background
noise, patients moaning, doctors eating their lunch, personal
conversations (oops they forgot the recorder was on) and other
incomprehensible noise. Not to mention, ESL doctors with heavy
accents and very tired ER doctors after a long shift!
At this time there is no voice recognition software which can
handle this type of voice recognition. It is impossible for the
software to determine actual speech from mistakes in
conversation, background noise, heavy accents, etc.
So what does this mean for our future?
Rumors of MTs being out of r a job have been around long before
I became an MT. Eight years later, there are still no real
advances in this field.
Can voice recognition ever replace transcriptionists?
Sure it can.
If a doctor is willing to sit down and take the sufficient time
to train his voice recognition software to recognize his voice
and speech patterns (this takes time and is not done
automatically), yes it is possible.
If the doctor thereafter dictates very clearly, using proper
punctuation in his speech (stopping for periods, pausing for
commas) without any background noise or interruptions. Yes, it
is possible.
Will the document be 100% accurate?
No.
Remember medical records have to be in compliance with a number
of very strict regulations. Most doctors, will not trust voice
recognition enough to send these records through without at
least a quick glance through.
Even under the best dictating circumstances the report will
still need to be proofread and edited. So, yes under the
"perfect" circumstances, voice recognition can replace a
transcriptionist.
Is it likely? Not unless every physician out there is willing to
take the time, energy and ongoing effort to train their voice
recognition software and maintain a certain standard of
dictation.
I don't see that happening any time soon. Doctors are busy
people, remember? ;)
If anything, us MTs should embrace voice recognition and use it
as a tool to help us in our MT careers. If applied properly, it
can be a time-saving tool. So why not use it for our purposes?
As with any business to stay ahead of the game you have to adapt
to change and technology. Learn how to use it to your advantage
instead of being frightened by it. That's the only way to stay
ahead of the competition.... Voice recognition or otherwise.