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Medical Transcription (MT)
Overview
Medical Transcription (MT) is defined as the interpretation
and conversion of the dictations of physicians and other healthcare
professionals into electronic form. This is done in order
to document patient records and establish a permanent patient
file - which include patient's assessment, therapeutic procedures,
clinical course, diagnosis, prognosis, outpatient follow-ups
- to facilitate total patient care and healthcare services.
In addition, MT provides solutions to the need to generate
and establish basic hospital data, the need to document medical
data and procedures essential for research, and the need to
establish and maintain medical records for insurance purposes.
The MT industry offers a wide range of transcription work
that include Emergency Reports, Consultation Reports, History
and Physical Reports, Clinical Notes, Psychiatric Evaluation,
Laboratory Reports, Pathology Reports, Operative Reports,
X-ray Reports, Progress Reports, Discharge Reports, and Office
Visits.
These reports contain information dictated by a doctor or
a healthcare professional that the medical transcriptionist
interprets and transcribes. The end result is an electronically-written
copy of the original audio file.
Nature of Work
The primary task of the medical transcriptionist is to transcribe,
format and proofread medical records. Medical records for
transcription are primarily sourced from the USA. They are
outsourced for transcription from a variety of healthcare
settings including doctor's offices, private/public hospitals,
clinics, laboratories, legal offices, veterinary and medical
clinics, research centers. Dictations are done not only by
doctors but also by surgeons, nurses pharmacists, therapists,
nurses and other paramedical staff. Medical transcriptionists
receive the doctor's dictation by tape, digital systems or
as a voice data file. Digitized data through the Internet
is the most common means of receiving medical data from the
USA.
The local transcription company receives the data and they
uncompress it. At this point, the medical transcriptionist
takes over. Using a suitable word processing programme/application
the audio file is transcribed and edited. There are two stages
in MT. The first is the actual process of transcription by
a medical transcriptionist and then this is followed by proofreading
and editing. The medical record - now in text form - is then
routed back to the concerned doctor or hospital.
Growth Prospect
Medical transcription was initially an in-house affair completed
within the four walls of the doctor's office or hospital itself.
Contracting out transcription work abroad-to countries such
as Philippines-has grown more popular as transmitting confidential
health information over the Internet has become more secure
and with the advent of high-speed satellite links and a much
lower outsourcing costs. Medical transcription is now an emerging
industry in the Philippines and it is projected to become
a multibillion-peso earner in the next 5 to 10 years.
Job Outlook
Job opportunities will be good. Employment of medical transcriptionists
is projected to grow faster than the average for all occupations
through 2012. Demand for medical transcription services will
be spurred by a growing and aging population. Older age groups
receive proportionately greater numbers of medical tests,
treatments, and procedures that require documentation. A high
level of demand for transcription services also will be sustained
by the continued need for electronic documentation that can
be easily shared among providers, third-party payers, regulators,
and consumers. Growing numbers of medical transcriptionists
will be needed to amend patients' records, edit for grammar,
and identify discrepancies in medical records.
Related Occupations
With additional education or training, medical transcriptionists
can diversify into the following areas of work, some become
medical records and health information technicians, medical
coders, or medical records and health information administrators.
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