EMR will not take the place of the medical transcriptionist.

Electronic Medical Records is how the patient’s records are stored, not how they are transcribed.  

Instead of having paper files for each patient, the facility will store the records electronically.

Electronic records will not change how the medical transcriptionist transcribes the report. 

Many years ago; medical transcription was dictated on tapes and transcribed on typewriters, then we moved on to computers.

The next change in technology was when the dictations were dictated in a digital format, and the MT could hear the dictation on devices such as a C-Phone, CD or over the Internet. They would then transcribe the dictation into a report formatted document and upload the document digitally back to the physician or medical transcription company that they work with.

MTs love being able to work at home by using the digital transcription method. They receive their dictation files over the Internet and transcribe them from their home office.  Once they are done, they then upload them back to the facility’s secure server.

Some doctors also use voice-recognition software to create a draft medical report. 

This has opened up additional avenues for MTs such as medical transcription editing.

Voice-recognition software simply cannot produce error-free reports!  

A computer cannot decipher between sound-a-like words or complex medical terms.    

The transcriptionist will listen to the doctor dictation while reviewing the draft medical report.  The MT will correct any errors and send the report back to the doctor.

A lot of physicians tried this method when it first came out and thought it was great, at first. However, when they had to “train” the software to their voice and go back to correct the many mistakes the software would create on the report; they realized they were losing money and time. 

They then went back to use the medical transcriptionist!

Some physicians that continue to use the SRT (Speech Recognition Technology also known as Voice Recognition) are still having MTs listen to the digital dictation and edit the report that the SRT created to ensure accuracy as we mentioned above.

For those MTs that do editing, most love it because by editing the VR/SRT report, they do not have to transcribe the entire report and continue to make money.

Every physician needs an “extra set of eyes” to review the patient report and make sure it is accurate.

MTs are the best "set of eyes" there can be because of the knowledge they have in both medical terminology. More law-suits related to healthcare are because of inaccurate information.

The EMR and EHR (Electronic Health Records) will allow information will be available to all the patient’s physicians to look at. If a patient's report has inaccurate information in it, then the next physician could make a wrong decision for that patient based on the report from another physician.

So you can see how very important it is to have MTs reviewing and editing these medical reports for complete accuracy.  

This is for both the patient and the physician’s benefit. The percentage of physicians that will transfer 100% to EMR / SRT systems and stick with it will be very small! Most will get frustrated with the SRT and will use MTs to transcribe the reports and then upload the reports into the EMR system.

It is because of the evolving technology that the transcriptionist will need to stay up to date with any changes. It is very important for anyone in the medical transcription career field to continue to keep updating with any new terms, style and formatting changes, and technology updates.    

MTs can further their career and job security by keeping up with any new updates in their career field and by taking their career to the next level.

Once you have completed a medical transcription training course to become an MT; you can take your RMT (Registered Medical Transcriptionist) exam and when you pass it, you will be a RMT.

The next step is to become a CMT (Certified Medical Transcriptionist).

To become a CMT, you would need to have taken a medical transcription training course and worked as an MT or RMT for at least two years. AHDI also requires you to have taken and passed the RMT exam before you can take the CMT exam.

Once you have worked for two years as an MT or RMT you can then take your CMT exam. 

There are also Continuing Education classes that are very inexpensive that you can take to improve your knowledge as an MT.  You can list all of these on your resume, and this will be a huge plus in your Medical Transcription Career.

Any career you get into takes time and effort, the serious medical transcriptionist will invest their time of keeping up with any changes in their career.

We hope this information has helped you to understand more about EMR / SRT and what it will mean to the medical transcriptionist.

The following quotes are from the source of the AHDI Sept. 2010 Plexus Issue about the Medical Transcription Career. 

(AHDI was formerly known as AAMT - American Association for Medical Transcription)

We recommend all MTs to become a member of AHDI!

“There is the perception that transcription is either being off-shored at an alarming rate and that transcription jobs will become extinct here in the United States or that voice recognition will make the transcriptionist obsolete, thus taking the human out of the picture.

The fact is that dictation has increased at a rate faster than we can educate or re-educate domestic transcriptionist. We are 35,000 transcriptionist short.  

We need to take a serious look at the process itself and make significant progress filling the vacancies with a qualified and educated workforce.”

“Current statistics suggest that the US medical transcription industry’s workload is increasing by 20% annually, andthat manpower is decreasing by 10% making the question of who will do the work a difficult one to answer.”

“US Department of Labor has recognized the industry shortage of US transcriptionist and took action by recently declaring medical transcription to be an apprenticeable profession, which is the first step to establishing a national apprenticeship program.”

The above quotes are from the source of the AHDI Plexus September 2010 / Volume 5, Issue 5 articles. To find out how you can obtain copies of the Plexus Magazine, please visit the AHDI website. Members of AHDI receive these magazines as part of their membership.

We highly recommend all students (regardless of what medical transcription school you went through) to become a Student Member of AHDI. They will keep you up to date on all the different changes in the medical transcription career field.