Accuracy is a crucial factor in medical transcription. However, turnaround time is also critical when it comes to transcribing emergency room (ER) reports or medical reports supporting urgent care. Emergency care centers are busy places where doctors treat patients for life-threatening problems such as chest pain, serious injuries and more, and related reports need to be transcribed quickly and accurately. ER reports include patient progress reports, history and physical reports, chart notes, medical evaluations and other details. However, there are several challenges involved in transcribing ER medical reports in short turnaround time:
- Audio Quality – Recordings with background noise are difficult to transcribe quickly and would require several rounds of listening. While a clear recording may take about 10 minutes to transcribe, a complex recording with poor audio quality can take around 15 minutes or more to document. In most cases, audio problems occur for recordings made without using microphones. Background noises and echo can be minimized with a microphone as it captures the speaker’s voice more efficiently.
- Emergency Physicians’ Accent and Speed – If the ER physician has a strong or unfamiliar accent, the transcriptionist would need more time to understand what they are saying. This would also be the case if they talk too fast. Such issues are of course minimized if the medical transcription is handled by skilled and experienced professionals.
- Various Kinds of Technical Terms – ER doctors specialize in trauma care, advanced cardiac life support, and management of other life-threatening conditions. Terminologies would pertain to multiple specialties such as cardiology, anesthesia, critical care medicine, ENT and orthopedic surgery and so on. This means that their reports would contain a large number of complex technical terms, those related to surgical procedures, life support, trauma resuscitation. The medical transcriptionists preparing ER room documentation should be well-versed in all these terminologies and procedures and be able to provide them with accurate reports so that they can make quick decisions.
- Typing Speed – If everything goes well, but the transcriptionist does not have good typing speed, then emergency case reports would be delayed. For instance, a person with a typing speed of 50 words per minute would take 15 minutes to transcribe a medical report, but the same matter can be transcribed within 10 minutes if typing speed were faster.
An experienced medical transcription company can easily handle these challenges. With a dedicated team of skilled transcriptionists to handle emergency room transcription service, a professional service provider can deliver efficient and affordable documentation solutions within specified turnaround time.
