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

Kaiser Permanente San Francisco Bay Area Uses Dragon - Borrowed KP time

Posted: May 12, 2010

Kaiser Permanente started using Dragon vr software about 4 years ago. It started with one or two doctors, then gradually spread to all +/- 35 Radiologists. I am now in "redeployment status"--Kaiser notified me late August 2009 that my job of 12 years is terminated as of August 2010. Too bad landlords doesn't speak Hospital Efficiency...anyway, the idea was to give patients 'instant access' to their diagnoses, which I understand. But I mean, at what cost (other than loss of employment lol)? Some of the docs hate it. One said Dragon was cumbersome to learn, "like driving a stick-shift". The biggest impact I've seen, though, is the corrupted reports that get signed off by fast talking MD's. To my knowledge, the Kaiser I work at has no official "editing" protocol in place--they certainly didn't ask us evaporating MT's to provide assistance in this area--and some of the reports I've stumbled across have been pretty interesting. One report I saw was comprised of random words strung together; they were spelled correctly and ~kind of~ made grammatical sense, but contextually were waaaaaaaay off. I saw the rad's name, and when I imagined her voice dictating the report, I completely understood what the sentense was supposed to say. It was hilarious! The "sounds" were correct, but the words that freakin Dragon program came up with...my goodness! Another doctor has been resisting strenuously the use of VR for diagnosing. She uses Dragon for emails and the like, but adamantly sticks to cassettes lol for her interpretations. And this one other doctor, he just dictates or self-types, period. What all of this told me is that Kaiser must have been putting some pressure on the docs to use vr; As opposed to 'ok, here's an alternative thing for you guys to use', it was more like, 'ok this is how it's going to be. Heeeere MT, MT, MT, we got a surprise for you..." and guillotine chop.

Well, I've sent out 28 transfer applications so far, heard back from only one. I would speculate that the quality of my work is perhaps to blame, except that my performance evals are always stellar, if I may toot my own horn :)

Kaiser Permanente - Pauline

[ In Reply To ..]
They had one good salesman for sure. The electronic age is killing our profession out in my opinion. My family doctor uses Dragon because most of the group he is in use it, but he told me it takes him twice as long to dictate because he has to correct just about everything he says. Our hospital totally outsourced our MT Dept 2 years ago, but kept Radiology. I now make half the money I used to. I have a friend who works in Radiology and she says they are switching over to VR this fall. They told them that most likely some MTs would be laid off. I told her that would be okay if they paid her the same hourly salary, but she was a low person on the totem pole. From what I hear, it seems to me like it would take longer to correct the mess of dictation and try to make sense out of it. I have never tried it though. Good luck finding a job.

Similar Messages:

Dec 21, 2014

QA picked this up. I had ischiococcygeal area which I could find listed as one word on google, but I could not find it listed by search criteria which I separated the 2 words. I can find ischial and coccyx, but not together as the dictator is stating. The only thing that makes me wonder iif QA is right is the context before the words. He stated he has 2 ulcers at the ischiococcygeal area. It seems like in this case it would be ischial and coccyx, but I cannot docume ...

Apr 02, 2010

Apparently they are making us switch to United Healthcare (probably cheaper I I think Kaiser is only in CA (???). I really like my doctor at Kaiser but I guess I'll have to say good bye to her. As for United, could anyone give me any info on this plan, whether you like it, what the insurance premiums are like for a single person, etc. Any info appreciated :) Thanks! ...

Apr 03, 2010

I live in California and MedQuist has just decided to cancel their contract with Kaiser which we have had for years. I really don't want to start over finding a new doctor but I am willing to find a new place of employment so I can keep my insurance with Kaiser. Thanks for the info. It is very hard to find this information on the internet. ...

Aug 20, 2010

http://philadelphia.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/stories/2010/08/16/daily23.html Medical transcription services company MedQuist Inc. has agreed to pay Kaiser Permanente $2 million to settle a lawsuit in which the health-care company alleged MedQuist inflated its costs. Kaiser of Oakland, Calif., filed its lawsuit against MedQuist (NASDAQ:MEDQ) during the summer of 2008. Under the terms of the settlement, MedQuist of Mount Laurel, N.J., made a single lump sum payme ...

Dec 05, 2009

Just got Dragon 10. Install and setup went smoothly (although tedious) and was using it without a problem for almost a week. Then one day it just stopped working. The program won't even start. Anyone else have this problem and if so, how'd you fix it? I want to avoid reinstalling it since it already has several user profiles set up and was working well. Also, I noticed it's a HUGE resource hog and I really can't run anything else at the same ti ...

Feb 21, 2010

Does anyone here do editing with Dragon? The office that I have worked for for 9 years went to EMR last year. They have not had anyone editing their stuff and it looks like crap. The office manager sent me an email asking if I would be interested in doing the editing now that the last doctor is going to start on the EMR system. I do not know what the name of the EMR system is only that the docs use Dragon to dictate into. I have several ques ...

Sep 11, 2012

Does anyone know how to add p.o. into the vocabulary editor of Dragon? The problem comes up due to there being no "spoken form" that the system recognizes. Thanks in advance! ...

Jun 25, 2013

I work for a hospital doing acute care/clinic work. We have a handful of docs using Dragon, and the plans for the future are to implement "Dynamic Dictation" for all clinic providers. Administration recently notified us that they want us to start doing QA on the docs who use Dragon. Of course, we are thrilled as this means job security. Just wondering if anyone else is doing the same? ...

Jan 13, 2014

...at the inaccuracies. Everything that everybody has said on this board is true with regard to blatant and flagrant errors even when the dictation is crystal clear! For me particularly, one of the most annoying things is how there is a word put in there that was not even dictated. HOW DOES THAT HAPPEN? In addition, when "not" is dictated, but is not put into a report. That can be so very detrimental to patient care if not caught, and it is so very easy to overlook. OMG, I cannot believe these e ...

Sep 04, 2014

I was wondering if anyone uses Dragon Naturally Speaking Professional to manage their workload as an IC. I would like to be able to input my voicefiles into Dragon and have it produce a draft for me to edit (like at an MTSO). I need to be able to create the profiles without needing to "teach" it because I want to have a different profile for each doctor I have so it will be more accurate. I am wondering if the cost would be worth the time savings or not. I know it wasn&# ...

Nov 24, 2009

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Dragon+with+medical+transcription&search_type=&aq=f Call them sales pitches or actual demos (i.e. talking about the Phillips microphone), these are the real thing. It's Dragon in action. Draw your own conclusions. And there's an additional video down the page from the organization formerly known as AAMT. ...

May 07, 2010

Okay...so I was in Walmart and noticed that they had Dragon Essentials for $40 so I grabbed it, not really thinking about which version it was, just knowing that I usually see Dragon for $100+. And I'm not about to spend $1500 for Dragon Medical right now. Before I open the box and can't return it....can we even really use this version for transcription work? I've tried Googling the topic but can't really get a clear answer on this and I've also come across some d ...

Aug 26, 2012

My son's pediatrician says she tried the Dragon product for doctor's to dictate and edit their own work. She says Vyvanse came out as underpants and every time she tried to correct it, it came out something else - even after she spelled it. She gave up -- what a surprise..... I think that has a place in clinic work, if doctors aren't pressed to see a thousand patients in a day by their employer, but definitely not fit for hospital dictation. Frankly, I w ...

Mar 05, 2014

The company I work for is currently looking into a new transcription program and have been asking about Dragon. We currently do only straight typing and do a lot of copying and pasting from previous notes. My concern for VR is that we would spend more time fixing formatting issues than if we just straight typed. I would greatly appreciate any feedback from those who have used Dragon. I welcome all opinions, suggestions, etc. Thanks for your time! ...

Jun 04, 2014

I went to see a chiropracter this morning and he asked me what I "do" and I told him that I am a transcriptionist and I work for Nuance - he told me that he has used Dragon to dictate his reports for about 6 years and he thought it was great when he first got it, but he said that in the last year or so, it is starting to put in things that he isn't saying. He said one day it started substituting the word sex for six - he solved that by taking the word "sex" out of it so it can� ...

Jun 24, 2014

Anyone have thoughts on using program such as Dragon to "re-dictate" reports to save some transcription time and hopefully save further wear and tear? Not an expensive program start-up but willing to spend some time to set up a more basic program to work. My shoulder is nearly frozen, again. Us old-schoolers are wearing out. Thanks! ...

Jan 15, 2010

Anybody using this VR program for editing. If so, what type of foot pedal works with this OR are there function keys that can be used to control rewind/play/forward? Thanks for your help. ...

Dec 16, 2011

I have the Standard version 10 and had to deal with a lot of bug issues with it. I love the program, but I didn't like the constant problems with trying to download updates, etc. (I have Vista). I wondered if anyone else out there bought this updated version and was pleased with it. I'm hoping to hear that they have the bugs worked out of this program, as the program itself is great and a valuable assest to an MT who types in Word. Any feedback a ...

Jan 26, 2013

I'm new to medical transcription and thinking about buying Dragon software. Does it work on wav files from different doctors? If you have a Mac and MacSpeech could you transfer those files to the Mac and then back to the PC to send back? I don't want all of my work done through Dragon, I just want it more for clarification and accuracy. Thanks! ...

Apr 19, 2013

Anyone out there doing QA for PDOC/Dragon programs, in Meditech? We are just finding out that ONLY the physician can access and do editing, which is not working out. Does anyone know if there any "fixes" for this so that a transcriptionist/editor can "clean up" the reports? Any help or suggestions would be appreciated. ...

Mar 05, 2014

Does anyone use Dragon Naturally Speaking with Fluency? ...

Mar 28, 2014

Question for those who work from home on eScription - Dragon Medical 360, what is the real purpose of doing: Alt + . when one, when at the right point, can just do "." on its own? Does that have something to do with how Nuance charges the client for lines? I was just wondering if anyone knows. Appreciate an answer to this. ...

Jun 13, 2014

The Dragon and sending work to India and the Philippines has taken over the hospitals. Nuance is the Dragon and they now get their 2 cents. That is part of the reason our pay has gone down...eaten up by the year of the Dragon. Guess that would mean health care has gone to the Dragon, the CEOs and insurance companies. ...

Aug 27, 2014

What headset with mic would you recommend for Dragon under $100. Thanks in advance. ...

May 22, 2015

If so, how is your line count and quality? ...

Nov 06, 2009

Has anyone used Dragon NS instead of transcribing? Does it take a long time to train it? Is it really faster and worth the money? Thanks! ...

Jan 18, 2010

I was thinking of using this as a replacement for typing/transcribing. For example when I hear the dictation, I then repeat it to the Dragon voice recognition software, and it types for me. (You need to read the post before this one for it to all make sense -- sorry!) Thanks, Abby ...

Apr 12, 2010

Can anyone tell me if there is some sort of formula for pricing out the finall editing of a DragonSpeak report? I am assuming that it would be much less than if it were priced for typing the entire file. thanks, bill ...

Aug 07, 2010

I had a stroke five years ago and started using Dragon to transcribe after having done transcription for 30 years by typing. It works okay with Dictaphone, but I am at a loss as to how to make it work with wave files that come over the internet. As almost everything is done this way now, does anyone know if it is possible to use two sound cards, one for dragon and one for wave files or if there is some way I can make this work so that I can still work? Dragon can be a nightmare ...

Sep 24, 2010

Does anyone know if Dragon Naturally Speaking can work with the old verson of the old Medrite transcription platform? Thanks. ...