Voice Recognition, star date 9522.6

Whenever I hear talk about “Voice Recognition” software, I think of Scotty in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home when he and Bones have traveled back to our time and have to use a computer.  See the clip here.  While VR is certainly a reality in the here and now, we are still light years away from anything remotely like what we see in the movies.

While there are companies who already use VR, these reports still MUST be edited by MTs.  Last year, I was offered two different positions with a company, one on an account that used VR at 4.5 cpl and one “regular” account at 7.5 cpl. I ended up taking a better paying position with another company who recognized “mah skillz”, so I personally have never worked with VR generated reports.  If any of my readers have worked with VR, I’d like to hear your take on it.  Are you making as much income being an editor for VR as you were typing “verbatim” as an MT?  I would be most interested to hear all about your experiences, good or bad.

Obviously VR will never, ever, ever completely replace a human being at the end of the process ensuring that the finished product is 100% error free.  Below is a 3.5 minute video produced by home-medical-transcription.com that says essentially the same thing in the nice, friendly, patronizing way that industrial videos do: (Sigh, I’m going to have to get my own domain, WordPress kicked out my embedded video… you can see it here)

The company I currently work for has certain accounts that are VR, but then there are those physicians who will NEVER be able to take advantage of VR for a plethora of reasons.  Personally, I think it’s because they don’t want to take the time to learn how to dictate for VR, because it would mean they would have to speak intelligibly on a regular basis, and that’s a stretch for most docs I know…

Another good YouTube video is about 10 minutes long and has a grand overview of electronic medical records, but a physician at Beth-Israel addresses VR at 5:15 from the hospital point of view.  Obviously, our roles are going to eventually change to more editing with VR than typing… but to do so will still require education and training in medical transcription, no doubt about that. 

It’s okay, you can stop wringing your hands, no computer is EVER going to be able to replace a person, no matter how hard they try.  Oh, there have been incredible breakthroughs in technology, no doubting that, but no computer will ever be able to match the human brain in terms of speed, logic, and reasoning.  Medical transcription is one profession with definite job security for the long-run.

You might be an MT if…

Adapted from an email I received from a friend.  I’ve seen this floating around the internet before, but it’s always funny!

YOU MIGHT BE A MEDICAL TRANSCRIPTIONIST IF:

Someone yells “duck” and the first word that comes to mind is d-u-c-t.

Grammar mistakes, no matter where they are – the church bulletin, Facebook status updates, etc. – drive you insane because you can’t correct them…

You know your gluteus maximus from your olecranon process.

Your favorite 3 words are “end of dictation.”

You refer to making your holiday turkey as prepping and draping in the usual fashion.

You guess the outcome of CSI in the first 5 minutes of the show after hearing the (not-so-mysterious) mysterious cause of death.

You can’t go into a doctor’s office without asking the receptionist “Who does your medical transcription?” or commenting to your own doctor that you think he’s a bad dictator and you feel sorry for the MT working for him.

Your doctor tells you that you have a problem with your back but doesn’t want to confuse you with the details and you ask him — “Were sagittal and coronal T1-weighted images performed and T2- and proton density-weighted images also obtained?”

You think percussion is something that belongs more in a medical report than in a rock band.

You say to your honey, “skip the flowers and chocolate for my birthday and get me the latest version of Stedman’s Medical and Pharma spellchecker.”

Your neighbor comes to you to make a diagnosis based on a series of symptoms and advise them on whether to have surgery or not. (you refuse of course LOL)

Your favorite quote is “Acronyms bad, verbose originators good.”

You can fix stuck keys on your computer keyboard by turning it upside down and banging out the crumbs.

The first place your husband and children look for you is at your desk rather than in the kitchen.

Your husband and children have to wave their hand between your face and the computer screen to get your attention.

You can fold laundry while sitting at your desk and listening to the latest dictator who speaks 5 words in 60 seconds… and still changes his mind 4 times on exactly how to put it.

You have a bladder capacity of more than a quart.

You have a bookshelf by your desk in which no two books are the same color.

Your dream is to someday have every book Stedman’s makes.

Your wrist rest has food spots on it. (you all know you have it)

No one who doesn’t know how to touch type can use your computer keyboard because at least half the keys have the letters worn off.

Your friends have to learn your macro names in order to read your emails to them.

Your husband and children have to learn your macro names in order to read the notes you write them.

You are the only one in your family who can understand the clerks at the 7-11.

You find watching only one TV screen at a time boring.

You correct the pharmacist’s spelling.

It aggravates you that the keys on the telephone keypad are in a different order than the keys on the 10-key pad on your computer keyboard.

More than half the icons on your desktop have to do with drugs or dictionaries.

There are more coffee cups in your office than there are in the kitchen.

Your friends want you to go to their doctor appointments with them so you can act as an interpreter.

You go to the doctor with your spouse who tells the doctor, “She’s a medical transcriptionist so I’ll let her tell you what’s wrong with me.” To this, the doctor replies, “OK…would you prefer to tell me or do you want to type it?”

You watch television commercials for prescription drugs very closely to see what the generic form is and how both are spelled.

You get an invitation to something that specifies “work attire” and you wonder if that means fluffy slippers, flip flops – or if it would be okay to show up barefoot.

You go to start the car to go to the grocery store and find the battery is dead. You don’t know how long it’s been dead.

One yucky week

Wow, that was one yucky week… It all started Sunday after breakfast at Cracker Barrel.  You know that feeling… the feeling that your insides are going to suddenly detonate, sending you into a half-seizure like walk/trot to safety that can only be described as “robot meets gimpy”, holding your breath and praying that there is no one else in there… and that you can make it before the bomb goes off… and please God, let there be toilet paper…

So, last few days, I have been erstwhile occupied with getting better.  I am deeply indebted to the innovators of Pepto Bismol, Imodium, Saltines and Gatorade, and should probably buy stock in those companies after this experience.   Just scrounging enough energy to make my work quota was torture, so I’ve been neglecting the blog (and my stats show it) in favor of sleep and rest.   

On the bright side, losing 3 pounds in 4 days did sort of “jump start” my oh-my-God-I-can’t-fit-in-my-summer-clothes diet.  It just wasn’t exactly the way I had planned it. 

So I apologize for being persona non grata for this week.  I’m pretty much back to myself now and will be jumping back into the swing of things.  I made a list of what I wanted to write about when I was feeling better… now I need a week off from work just to write all these articles!  So, get your reader feeders ready…. here I come!

Getting this thing going….

I am brand new to blogging, but not so new to medical transcription.  I get asked a lot of questions about transcription, especially by homeschoolers during these tough economic times.  So, I figured, why the heck not? It would certainly save me from having to tell my story over and over and over… you get the idea.  I was an MT before I started homeschooling, so I’ll also be talking about how I manage both.  The purpose of this blog is to answer questions about prospective careers as a medical transcriptionist, help people decide if this is REALLY what they want to do, and give a road map to success.

I’ve been an MT for 10+ years, but I certainly do not see myself as any “ultimate authority” on the subject.  I believe you can learn something new every day, so I welcome any seasoned MTs to add their 2 cents at any time, especially reviews for companies they’ve worked for — although, please stick to more “pros and cons” and less venting about the office nazi who drove you to the brink of insanity…  I’ll have a special place for that eventually, I promise =D.

I hope to take the time this coming weekend to finish my research and get some good information out there for you.