Medical transcription has undergone tremendous changes over the years. The introduction of the EHR system made a huge impact on medical transcription and many believed that medical transcription would fade away with time. While the adoption of EHR promised substantial benefits to both healthcare professionals and the patients, it also had some serious unintended consequences and this has led to the continuing need for medical transcription. Medical transcription services help with the collection of patient narratives, documentation of medical records, and make the patient’s record in the EHR more complete. This means medical transcription still plays a crucial role in medical documentation which is used as a base for coding and insurance processing, and also helps with revenue generation for healthcare organizations.
Physicians spend most of their time writing notes and recording patient information. This takes away a huge amount of time that could be spent talking to patients or treating them; it also affects the quality of patient care. Medical transcription provides an efficient solution by converting doctors’ audio files into text format and storing them in a centralized location without any hassle. Medical transcriptionists can access a doctor’s recorded files on a cloud platform and transcribe them into text format within a few minutes. The doctor can then review the transcribed files for any errors or modifications.
When a patient visits a doctor, the physician records every detail such as the physical condition of the patient, her medical history, lab and pathology reports, tests, given medicines, and diagnoses into an audio file. These audio files are transcribed by experienced medical transcriptionists. They follow multi-tier quality check to ensure accuracy. With HL7 integration, the transcription providers can upload the transcribed medical reports into the physicians’ EHR. This allows physicians to access the EHR records anytime. The transcribed notes not only help with patient care, but also help in obtaining quick reimbursement of medical claims, and also help with medico legal issues. The following are some of the ways in which medical transcription helps the healthcare industry:
- Facilitates collaboration: Be it large hospitals or small medical clinics, doctors always aim at listening to and curing the patients’ health concerns and also record accurate patient data, which is the most vital element for providing patient care. The patient may sometimes need expertise from diverse medical disciplines. Doctors from different specialties may need to work together to provide the best treatment plan and save the patient. In such situations, having a clear and accurate medical record and treatment information ensures that the communication between different practitioners is crisp and vibrant and they understand the treatment plan well.
- Useful for Insurance settlements: As mentioned earlier, accurate medical records ensure that proper patient care is provided around a comprehensive medical staff, and healthcare providers are protected from legal conflicts and lawsuits. Reliable and compliant medical documentation is not just used for providing better care to the patient, but it is also important for the operations and maintenance of your healthcare organization. The billing and coding staff use transcribed medical records to bill insurance companies. Therefore, it is important to ensure that the medical records are accurate.
- Ensures utmost accuracy: Delivering correct treatment to the patient is important and with accurate transcription, it is easier to manage patient records and their treatment. The transcripts include the present health status of the patient and measures to cure the disease, and also expand the efficiency of medical practitioners.
- Helpful to support staff: Transcription provides instruction to the supporting medical staff. In the absence of the doctor, the nurses and the compounder use medical transcripts as a guide to provide the right treatment and care. It also helps them to look for any warning signs or symptoms and follow the exact dosage of medicine prescribed. So with accurate medical records, the nurses or the compounder can also provide the right treatment in case of any emergency.
- Saves valuable life: In some critical cases, the patient may be sent to other countries for better patient care and treatment solutions. In such cases, multi lingual transcription of medical records is important to help the doctors provide precise treatment to the patients. The transcribed medical record also helps the doctors to understand the current status of patient’s health, medicines they are prescribed and an account of the illness. Most of the time, a patient is treated by more than one healthcare provider and with error-free transcribed notes, the communication between the doctors becomes smooth, and it also helps to save the patient’s life.
All the above-mentioned points show that medical transcription still plays a crucial role in the healthcare sector. Right from adopting the latest technologies to improving patient care, the healthcare industry has been undergoing a massive transformation to overcome its challenges and provide high-quality care. Amidst these challenges, outsourcing medical transcription plays an important role in easing the workload of doctors and improving patient care.
