Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Medical transcription outsourcing: Helps in optimizing capacity management

Along with the rest of the world, the healthcare sector also has moved on into the information technology era. Healthcare draws upon information technology to operate better in an increasingly competitive environment. Though the contribution of information technology to the actual process of healthcare may not be direct, it helps in improving the efficiency of the healthcare facility. One such area that is positively affected by information technology is that of managing clinical documentation of which medical transcription is an important component by helping created accurate, timely, cost- effective and secure patient medical records. Efficient medical transcription requires information technology to meet all these criteria.

Though Information technology provides valuable support in various aspects of running a healthcare facility, investing in information technology is a costly proposition and would dilute the focus of resources from the core business of the healthcare facility. Outsourcing medical transcription is an ideal solution for healthcare facilities and healthcare professionals and also helps optimize capacity management.

What is capacity management and how does outsourcing medical transcription help in the process of capacity management?

Capacity management is a process that seeks to ensure that the organization operates at optimum capacity while maintaining customer satisfaction levels by ensuring that information technology capacity meets current and future requirements in a cost-effective manner.

Outsourcing medical transcription helps in the capacity management aspect by helping healthcare professionals and healthcare facilities operate at their optimum capacity by ensuring that information required by them in the form of patient medical records for clinical decision making, risk management and revenue management is made available to them. This is done by using the right blend of technology and human expertise. The process of ensuring this is done in a proactive rather reactive manner to ensure efficiency and curb wastage.

Some of the benefits of outsourced medical transcription services in this aspect are:

Outsourced medical transcription service providers use software and tools for medical transcription, which include the following benefits:

Accepting different modes of dictation: Each healthcare professional has his/her own preferred mode for dictation. Outsourced medical transcription service providers have allowed them to continue using the mode of their choice by using the right technology to configure this into their transcription system

Automatic upload of audio files for the transcription process: Outsourced medical transcription service providers have enabled the upload of audio files at predetermined intervals to save on time and avoid delays.

Provision for healthcare professionals and support staff to keep track of work in progress: Considering the huge amount of data moving through healthcare facilities support staff at healthcare facilities would like to have the option to have a system that enables them to keep track of work in progress. Outsourced medical transcription service providers have provided for this in their transcription system

Delivery of transcripts through preferred modes: Outsourced medical transcription service providers have enabled secure and timely delivery of transcripts through the mode specified by the healthcare professional

Provision for electronic signature: The transcription systems used by outsourced medical transcription service providers enable healthcare professionals to view transcripts and sign off on them electronically.

Facility to enable remote printing and faxing: Transcripts can be faxed/ printed at remote locations at the touch of a button

Delivery to specified folders: Outsourced medical transcription service providers have also enabled the delivery of transcripts to specified folders

HL7 interface for EMR adoption: Outsourced medical transcription service providers have allowed for EMR adoption using HL7 interface while still retaining the preferred mode of documentation; dictation- transcription.

Ensuring HIPAA compliance through the entire transcription process including ensuring security during transmission: Maintaining the security and confidentiality of the document is vital. Outsourced medical transcription service providers provide for this throughout the entire process of transcription.

Providing editing and proofreading services for speech recognition software transcription: Some healthcare professionals have started using speech recognition software as a method of creating transcripts. It has been found that the accuracy levels of the transcripts using this method are unacceptable. Outsourced medical transcription service providers provide editing and proofreading facilities for these transcripts to help bring the accuracy levels to acceptable levels.

It can be seen that an experienced and technologically savvy medical transcription service provider can help with several aspects of capacity management.

TransDyne, a leader in the outsourced medical transcription industry has used their extensive background in information technology and their experience in serving the needs of the healthcare sector to provide affordable and integrated medical transcription solutions.

TransDyne offers quality medical transcription at reasonable prices, executed by experienced and qualified medical transcriptionists with a very quick turnaround time executed through secure HIPAA and HITECH compliant channels, with very high levels of accuracy and all this with technology that is advanced but easy to use!

To avail complete and reliable medical transcription services from TransDyne, click here.

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