In the world of healthcare, some times every second counts. A fraction of a second can save a life. Therefore it becomes very important for doctors to have the proper tools. Tools to streamline their work with time-saving benefits. So they can focus more on the patient and less time on things like documentation.
Proper documentation is so very important for doctors. Everything that happens with a patient must be documented in the patient’s health record. Entering this information manually can take away these essential seconds. The introduction of the EHR has saved a lot of time compared to traditional methods, but it still takes on average, 3-5 minutes per patient. This may not seem to be a lot of time, but add up the number of patients seen per day, and these few minutes can add up to hours.
This is where tools like Dragon Medical come into play. Enabling speech recognition in the EHR, as the name suggests, lets the doctors make entries in the EHR by simply speaking the information into a compatible microphone.
Top 5 Speech Recognition Advantages For EHRs
1. Real-Time Documentation
Doctors can record a patient’s data on a real-time basis. All they have to do is speak into the software on their phone/tablet and the software will automatically type the information on an ongoing basis.
2. Portable
Since most of the speech recognition software are off-the-shelf kind, all you need to do is simply install it on their portable device and they can dictate everything anywhere they want.
3. Speech Flexibility
Speech recognition software nowadays offers some options when it detects a possible mispronounced word. Now doctors can store information in the software with more accuracy. Just talk to the software and it will type what they said, exactly how they said it, word for word. And if the software finds a word confusing, it will prompt the doctor with some options along with the original word.
4. Vocabulary Rich
The speech-enabled software for EHR available nowadays comes with a huge inbuilt vocabulary. Since every field of work has its own specific vocabulary, called the jargons, it’s very important for speech recognition software to include these words so that it does not type some other word by mistake. For Example, medical speech recognition software should know the word cataplexy.
5. Saves Time
This is by far the biggest advantage of medical speech recognition software. Technology should help you save time, and this is exactly what this software does. Add accurate documentation and verbal navigation of the EHR, and you get a lot of time on your hands to take care of patients in a more efficient way.