A community of 30,000 US Transcriptionist serving Medical Transcription Industry

Started a new job in a real office and I am - really amazed at the

Posted: Jun 09, 2012

reports that are forwarded. Most of them are apparently computer generated and very hard to read. I always wondered what reports looked like at the customer end --- not very good from what I can tell. I have looked to try and see if the reports are transcribed or some sort of Epic or Dragon speak program. I would hate to be the doctors trying to wade through this jumbled-up information and make any sense out of a patient's history. We have two local hospitals and one of them uses an MTSO and the other has in-house transcriptionists. I can definitely tell the difference. The in-house reports are much better and are printed in a fashion that is more user friendly. Some clinic reports (the ones I suspect may be Epic or something of that sort) are so cryptic they are almost useless.

Not just EPIC... - L&L

[ In Reply To ..]
I work locally for 2 GI docs. One is wholeheartedly into EHR/EMR, the other refuses to use it. I only add a little bit of the first docs reports. He puts in a lot of the report himself. Nobody ever said you had to be literate to be a doctor. I used to have a lot of confusion with his 6-line run-in incomplete sentences but would try to make some sense with them. Now...it is up to the poor reader.

What you are seeing - me

[ In Reply To ..]
Is called structured data. For all the companies who do QA and bemoan commas, etc, the REALITY is insurance companies are driving this bus. Structured data needs only to get the FACTS across. The end product will eventually not worry about not only sentence structure, but sentences. Insurance/billing/coding/transcription - they will all settle for what gets them paid.

What you are seeing! - Not a novel!

[ In Reply To ..]
Someone said to me once, we are transcribing a document, not a novel and that is what is so frustrating with these companies who insist on all the of rules in the BOS, etc. Whether numbers are spelled out, how to transcribe lab results, with or without, if they say, the BUN is such and such or BUN such and such. Drives you crazy. Can't spell numbers below 10 or not, etc.

Agree, it is not a novel. - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
The AHDI and MTSO focus on trivia and on "medical terminology" to the exclusion of everything else did nothing but trap MTs in a dying role.

MTs never saw EHRs and all the expanded roles that accompany them. They never made the association between text and data, never saw the need to understand coding classification systems that drive that data (the structured data mentioned above), and never noticed the huge number of jobs opening up in informatics.

And now, still not seeing it, they bemoan the fact that EPIC is taking over, knowing so sadly little that they don't even recognize that EPIC is just one of many EHRs. It is just a brand name.

To get those jobs, MTs had to start preparing 5 years ago. The MTSOs kept them too busy scrambling to keep up with pay cuts and ridiculous QA activities while the AHDI kept them busy playing "Word Warriors" for continuing education. Now those new jobs are going to nurses, computer programmers, and even people off the street. The MTs are still typing away, accepting less than minimum wage thinking they are serving some noble medical purpose.

When are you folks going to wake up and get some training so you can find a better job?

Excellent Post. - Anon

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I agree completely.

Insightful, excellent. (sm) - MTforNow

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Even Claudia Tessier is recommending we get out.
(O.o)

which is probably one reason I would stay in - nm

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I think I've heard enough recommendations from any person who has been the Director of AAMT/AHDI. If I were on a hike with either of them in the woods and they said to go left, I would go right.

Let's have a discussion sometime about what happened to the organization under her leadership - Just sayin

[ In Reply To ..]
Okay, let's have a discussion about what happened with AAMT/AHDI under her leadership. How many of you were members during that period? What would you say was achieved for the benefit of the medical transcriptionist? I'm serious. Let's hear both the good and the bad. Personally, I think the BOS was an excellent idea. I'm trying to think of anything else. I can think of lots of negatives, but I really want to start with positives. I just can't think of any. Meetings and networking maybe? Those were places were members could enjoy getting to know the MTSOs, before they all had different agendas. Toward the end, the MTSOs were calling all the shots, huddling together in their own private little conferences making deals about mergers and projects, and leaving the rest of us to fend for ourselves. It ended up being the MTSOs in charge of the organization that was supposed to be about the MT.

What else?

I don't believe that she single-handledly ruined the organization - My thoughts

[ In Reply To ..]
I don't know which of the Directors is most responsible for the shape of the organization or if they actually meant well or not. It doesn't matter now. They are gone and we are all left to pick up the pieces. I don't know about the rest of you, but I've always had a tough time deciding who to vote for. We get little blips of information from all of the BOD candidates. They don't tell us much. They all sound like used car salesmen or Miss America pageant contestants. There is nothing of substance in those little blips of information. I've given up trying to decide what they would bring to the organization. That's sad though, because these are the people who make the decisions about where that organization is going. There needs to be a better way to choose leaders and get rid of them the moment there is a conflict of interest. In other words, I don't want a representative of any MTSO calling the shots for us, pushing us in one direction or another.

It's a matter of intelligence vs. common sense - See message

[ In Reply To ..]
I don't think anyone made bad decisions for us on purpose. These are people who were very successful for themselves. They were intelligent enough to do very well getting credentials and income for themselves. There was nothing stupid about them. Now you could make a very good argument about their lacking common sense. Motive can also be questioned. Personally, I just see it as people who are aggressively motivated to reach success. The organization was their tool to get them where they wanted to go in their own careers. The MT meant absolutely nothing to them.

That organization - Berkeleyite

[ In Reply To ..]
behaved more like sorority sisters than professionals. It would be funny if it were not so sad.

I think they compromised themselves out of being relevant - Respectfully Disagreeing

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I didn't see any of the sorority sister behavior. What I did see was a lot of compromising. They compromised on the importance of credentials while AHIMA and other organizations that were working for their members, as ours was not, managed to make credentials a requirement in order to work in those jobs. Almost all coding positions, for example, require credentials. You don't work as a nurse without credentials. Anyone and everyone can be a medical transcriptionist just by deciding to call themselves one. Nobody can tell them they aren't. That's why we have so many really unqualified so-called MTs. There is no required testing being done.

Then they compromised again on the school approval. They took a good idea and, because of the need for money I suppose, opened the door and let pretty much anyone and everyone in. That's when people started making fun of the Approved Schools list. It's meaningless when the general public looks at it and sees that there are schools there that shouldn't be. If a school isn't on that list, they have to be really, really bad, but just being on the list isn't very impressive because of some of the schools included.

Then there's the changing the name of the organization, taking "American" out of the name. Big mistake.

No, the organization's problems aren't about acting like sorority sisters. The problem is that mistakes were made that hurt us and nobody was looking out for us. They get in, take control, use their power to make bad mistakes, feather their own nests, and leave us holding the bag. The people there at this moment seem to be people trying to fix what was broken by the people who left. Is it too late? Time will tell.

Part of the reason they couldn't get required credentials done - Seems To Me

[ In Reply To ..]
There were times during the life of the organization that they tried hard to work for required credentials. That was in the best interests of qualified MTs. The only problem was, there are more UNqualified MTs than qualified. They knew they couldn't pass even an RMT test, much less a CMT, so they screamed bloody murder until the attempt to get that done failed. That hurt us big time. The voices of the unqualified MTs outnumbered and overpowered those who worked hard to get a good education and keep their skills sharp. Some of those who yelled the loudest against credential requirement should never have been allowed to work as MTs because they can't spell, can't type, and know much too little about terminology, A&P, pathyphysiology, pharmacology, etc. They knew they would fail, so instead of working to improve their own skills and help make the MT a more powerful, skilled, educated force, they chose to go the other route. They decided to howl about how useless the CMT exam was, because they knew they couldn't pass it. That may be one of the most important things that has hurt us. MTs needed to be respected. Employers needed to know that they could put in an ad for an MT, CMT credentials required. They can't though because there aren't enough CMTs. We can thank the thousands of unqualified MTs for that one.

Just saying - Berkeleyite

[ In Reply To ..]
I was a member during that time and I left because of......well, guess who?

I almost left because of her too, but decided not to let anyone run me off - Been There

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Those were tough years. If you didn't speak as you were instructed to speak, you'd better have kept your mouth shut---or else. I'm not really sure what the "or else" was. We got our marching orders and if you got out of step, you were what I would call blackballed.

I refused to leave, although I sure considered it many times. I just didn't like the idea of someone telling me, in effect, to sit down and shut up if you don't agree with the powers that be. I came to think of the officers and BOD as Stepford Wives. If you were there, you voted as instructed. If you weren't an officer or on the BOD, what you thought really didn't matter.

Then when we had a new Director, you could give an opinion. You could give all the opinions you wanted. Nobody minded at all. In fact, they welcomed it, because the decisions had already been made and you were wasting your breath.

It isn't like that now. It's true that they get in bed with too many special interests in an effort to bring income to keep the organization going. That's understandable, but it's a lose/lose situation. They make deals in order to stay viable and the deals they make are such a conflict of interest that it's killing the organization they were supposed to be saving.

The reason AHDI has all those seminars and workshops - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
The reason AHDI and various other companies keep presenting more workshops and seminars is not for the benefit of the MT. It's because they need to make money. Soon one of their leaders will come up with still another brilliant workshop that all MTs must attend. Why? Because they have determined that this topic is the answer. You must do it or feel as if you are falling behind. The only thing is, those workshops haven't achieved anything that I can see.

You want to learn editing? There's probably a workshop for that, but the best editors I know were excellent MTs who transitioned to editing as a natural path on the job.

You want to learn about speech recognition? There's probably a workshop for that. The only thing is, it's different from one company from the next and you don't learn it from a workshop anyway. If you know how to edit your own work, you have the skills to work with speech recognition. If you don't, you aren't going to learn that from a workshop. Don't hand me the verbal vs. visual speech. That's great marketing to relieve MTs of their hard-earned money, but it's just silly.

My advice is not to take shortcuts through seminars and workshops, online or in person. Whatever you decide to study, get solid, comprehensive training in it that doesn't require little quick-fixes. Don't go the easy route because it ends up being more expensive and less effective.

Whatever you decide to study and train in, do it right the first time. Don't depend on all the silliness that isn't put there to help anyone but the organizations and companies that are selling it.

The organization is more about the officers and leaders than the ordinary members - My point of view

[ In Reply To ..]
Any organization should represent its members or it doesn't deserve to exist. In order to do that, those who run it and/or lead it should be clear of any conflict of interest. In other words, if they make money off any product or service provided by that organization, it's a conflict of interest. Their vote as an officer is tainted. Too much of that has come close to ruining what would otherwise be a good organization. When something new comes out, I always ask myself who benefits from that product, service, or event. In the past 15 years or so, the average member has not benefited much, but others have made money from us. That has to change if it is to continue to be a viable organization. Any sponsor, business member, BOD member, officer or leader who is selling something is not working in the best interests of the members of an organization. Get that under control and members benefit from belonging. Otherwise, we're just paying for the opportunity to have events and products sold to us. I don't know many people who would think that was a good investment of an MT's time and money.

The reason AHDI has all of those seminars - Octopus

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is for the same reason they do anything else: SHOW ME THE MONEY! I surely hope that no one thinks AHDI is looking out for the transcriptionist. That is not so.

Not just the body of the report - -- above poster

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Sometimes I cannot find the ordering physician without a search, the reading physician (as on diagnostic imaging reports), the date of service, what KIND of report so I know where it goes in the chart, etc. It is a huge jumble of illegible information.

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