A new Day Rising

How will the electronic medical record movement affect medical transcription?

By Selena Chavis

Medical transcription, long the mainstay for healthcare documentation among providers, is forging into unknown territory as the industry redefines its role in the framework of EMRs. 

Like many facets of the healthcare industry, the transcription field is evolving around the electronic movement. Many questions have been raised about how medical transcription will be integrated into electronic medical records (EMRs) as the industry looks toward the future. While there are varying opinions about what the future holds, most experts agree that, at some point, the role of the medical transcriptionist will be redefined.

“I think the case is it will morph … and potentially be replaced … or evolve in a way that is different from what it is today,” says Claudia Tessier, RHIA, vice president of the Medical Records Institute. “I and others have the perspective that it will be encroached on unless it adapts and morphs.”

With the promise that EMRs bring to scaling healthcare costs and improving quality of care, Tessier points out that many in the healthcare industry see an opportunity to eliminate the practice of dictation and transcription in its current form. Gone would be the days of feverish typing from handheld dictation devices; the new era would have clinicians input their own documentation directly into patient records via the convenience of cell phones, pull-down menus, and point-and-click and free-text keyboard entry methods.

Add to those efficiencies the promise that many believe speech recognition technology holds, and Tessier says two questions about medical transcription emerge: When will direct data entry options have a significant impact on medical transcription, and what is medical transcription’s role in the transition to EMRs and computer-guided care?

But are potential changes to the process well thought out? Susan Lucci, RHIT, CMT, AHDI-F, director of transcription operations with TRS Transcription and president-elect of the Association for Healthcare Documentation Integrity (ADHI), believes that healthcare documentation is too complex to ever fully integrate into a point-and-click system.

“I think we’ll see a dramatic shift in the kind of work we receive—more severe, less physician office,” she says, pointing out that, in some situations, documentation requires a narrative from the physician. “I think that we can all agree that no two patients are the same. The drawback would be if we ever took it [narrative dictation] out entirely.” More ...