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

question for MTs that have switched to VR - frustrated former MT

Posted: Apr 20, 2010

I have only been doing this since February but I hate it. I have no motivation and my production stinks. How much more time should I give it before I give up on it? I really wanted to try it; love the company I work for, just am not making enough money. I have to admit, though my attitude is terrible. I don't even want to get out of bed and go to work these days anymore. How long did it take for you guys to make the change? I have been an MT for 27 years, can this old dog learn this new trick?

VR - mt

[ In Reply To ..]
Working nearly 100% VR at MedQuist has pummeled my salary down to minimum wage on many days.

It's all about the platform and how well it works with the accounts. Our VR platform at MQ is horrible.

Switch to VR - Raine59

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I've been doing VR for a couple of years. I have gotten used to it to the point that it's hard to do a regular transcription note (which I very rarely do). The only thing I don't like about it is that my pay has gone down and I haven't heard anyone say that their pay has gone up after switching to VR. It's always down. It seems to be the wave of the future. You mentioned "giving up on it" but do you have the choice to go back to regular transcription? Even though I made more doing regular transcription, now only the most horrible doctors are on regular transcription so going back wouldn't even help. In short, you will get used to it over time (hard to say how long, several months probably) but your pay will probably never recover.

can you elaborate on how much your pay has gone down? - not being snoopy

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I am just used to making in excess of $20/hour with transcription. Only a couple of times in the past two months have I achieved even $11/hour. I am told $16 is reasonable. I can live with that with benefits. But how realistic is this at .04/line for VR?

Pay on VR - Raine59

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My pay has probably gone down by about $2 per hour. I get 5 cents a line for VR. If it were 4, I couldn't live on it.

VR - ColtsFan

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I have been doing VR for several years and my biggest problem is that it doesn't hold my attention like actual transcribing did. I have found that if I set hourly goals for line counts that gives me a little more motivation and tends to keep my mind on my work. My line count has gone up considerably.

Okay, that sounds like a plan. What is realistic? Is 200 lph a fair shot for someone like me? - thx for help

[ In Reply To ..]
nm

VR goal - ColtFan

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I would probably set a goal a little higher than you currently are achieving and keep increasing it maybe weekly. I have a goal of 300 lines an hour now. I don't always make it due to some rotten reports but sometimes go above it, so it averages out pretty well. Just don't set it too high so that you're setting yourself up to fail from the start. Good luck!

VR goal - ColtsFan

[ In Reply To ..]
I thought of something else that helps quite a bit. Always increase the playback speed as much as you can. I don't increase it as much as possible, I'm afraid I'll miss something. I just increase it to where I still can comfortably understand the dictator. You can always slow it back down if you come across something you don't understand. This really does make a difference.

That's good advice. I was told that people working where I work do 400-500 lph SM - coltsfan2

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and I feel very depressed. I dont do anywhere near that. I use M-modal

Thank you!! You have given me some hope to improve my production and pay!! I appreciate all of your - nm

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nm

IMO, 400-500 lph is not average for an M-Modal MT - what I mean to say

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I think that 400-500 lph on M-Modal is NOT average. The average M-Modal MT (after many months) seems to get somewhere in the range of 200-250 lph, and maybe up to 300 lph if they are really good.

Where I worked, I was considered "good" and I averaged somewhere between 180 and 280 lph. There were many of the company's MT who were below that (I found this out from management). I was also told that their company-wide MT average on M-Modal was 240 lph.

In one of our ASR training sessions, we were told that M-Modal said that there is an MT who averages 500 lph working in M-Modal. Hmmm...."an MT" who averages 500 lph. That in itself sort of tells you that this is not your average MT.

I've heard that Escription is better for ASR, so maybe 400-500 lph may be possible on that program. But in my experience, it is a very rare MT who can achieve line rates like that in M-Modal.

I honestly don't mean to rain on your parade, but just didn't think it was right for you to become depressed and berate yourself if you can't achieve 400-500 lph, because again, it is not average if you're working in M-Modal and 200-300 lph would probably be more realistic.

Hmm.... - After only 2 weeks

[ In Reply To ..]
on M-Modal, 2 people on my team have already broken the 400 mark, and 10 more have broken 300.

And I know for a fact that some of these people have never done editing before, ever.

This probably has to do with your company's - specific M-Modal settings

[ In Reply To ..]
Here's a little information about how the ASR engine works on the backend of things, which the MTSO's IT department knows, but the MTs down in the trenches usually don't know.

When companies enable a dictator on ASR, one of the options that they can set is a percentage of how much the ASR engine is getting correct on that particular dictator.

If the company sets this percentage for say 75% (meaning that 75% of what ASR gets is correct and 25% was incorrect and has to be edited), the ASR reports that come through on the MT's end will be worse and will require a lot more editing.

However, if the company sets this option for say 90% (meaning that the ASR engine is getting 90% correct and only 10% has to be edited), the reports that the MT sees will be much better and require much less actual editing.

Many companies will set this percentage on the lower side so they can get more dictators enabled on ASR quicker. The MTSOs pay their ASR editors much less than they pay the traditional transcriptionists, so companies usually want to get the majority of the dictators moved over to ASR as quickly as possible. And this is the best way to do it...to lower the acceptable percentage of accuracy and set them for 75% instead of 90%.

The only problem with this is that, on the MT's side of things, they are working harder, editing 25% (or 1 out of every 4 words) in the document as opposed to editing 10% (or 1 out of 10 words).

I am using these percentages only as an example, because the MTSO can set this to anything they want. I have just seen that the tendency is for them to set this on the lower end in order to save money on their own internal transcription costs.

So, this is the reason why many MTs can never get up to that promised "productivity increase"...because the MTSO has set the acceptable accuracy rate too low. And this is what affects the MTs. It has them working hard, editing more of the report (in some cases every other word in the document), and this is what results in the MT's overall lower LPH.

Perhaps the company that you work for is one of the better ones where the MTSO has set the M-Modal percentage rate at the very high end. The more correct the ASR documents are, the faster the MT can go. It's all relative: More actual editing means lower LPH for the MT, while better and more accurate reports require less editing and thus a higher LPH for the MT.

The only way for the MT to know what percentage their MTSO is using for this option is to ask them. The good MTSOs will be honest and will tell you. Other MTSOs will probably either tell you they don't know, that's not my department, or I don't know what you're talking about.

We were specifically told... - re percentages

[ In Reply To ..]
that the "acceptable" percentage is indeed 75%; and if a dictator is lower than that, they put them back to B mode (straight typing) so the engine can do more training.

So even with that 75% threshold, we are still getting the numbers I mentioned above, after less than 2 weeks in edit mode.

This might be possible - but not probable

[ In Reply To ..]
I've been involved on both ends, the backend IT part the ASR engine, as well as on the MT side.

A percentage of 75% is only "acceptable" because it is your company that calls it "acceptable." But, this also means that only 75% of the record output is correct and the MT is editing up to 25% of it. In other words, the MT is editing 1 out of every four words in the document.

Very few MTs are able to get above 400-500 lph with the percentage set so low. Yes, there might be a few who will (and count your blessings if you are one of them), but the vast majority of MTs stay in the 200-300 lph range.

I've seen the actual numbers. If the "average" MT is editing 400-500 lph, then this is a company who has the percentage set higher, upwards of 90%.

thanks interesting, thanks for the info - coltsfan2

[ In Reply To ..]
xxx

My 2 cents regarding M-Modal - KLH

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We use M-Modal at the company I'm with. Every report that comes through has the percentage listed on that chart so I know going into it how much editing I'm going to have to do. I thought that was part of M-Modal and anyone who uses it would have the same thing. Is that not the case? My company's percentage is set at 80%. Sometimes I get a few that are 79% but that is rare. My LPH can run anywhere from 360 on a bad day to 420 on a good day. As stated, the more editing (crappy charts) you do, the lower your LPH. The better the chart, the faster you can move through it. I have to admit that I like editing a lot more than I thought I would, I just wish the money was there. I'm going to have to find a PT job to make up the difference in my pay since having to switch to VR.

I think the percentage the company has it set at is the key - VRMT

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I work for a company using M-Modal and it is set at 75% (or so they tell us) and I'm lucky to get 350 lph or so with all the editing needing to be done in the reports. That extra 5% would probably boost our production quite a good bit, but alas, these companies just don't seem to care about us, only THEIR bottom line...

I actually just accepted a job straight transcribing - frustrated . . .

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I just went through 4 reports in an hour because the editing was ridiculous. It seems to have actually gotten worse if that is possible. I cannot afford this; my family is suffering financially. For right now, I need to go back to straight transcription; perhaps down the road I can try it again. Thank you all for all of your input I have learned a lot and I appreciate your help.

VR editing - sublimelytragic

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I think it depends on the platform I can make just as much editing VR on EditScript (Escription) as straight typing I average 300-500 lph depending on the type of report My account consists mostly of ERs though that is why my line count is probably higher than average When I edit specialty clinics it drops to 275-350 Alot of my docs have thick Southern accents but EditScript does a pretty good job of recognizing what they say and after I make the editing changes it seems like I only have to change it a couple of times for SR to "learn" the change. However I gave up on M Modal after only 3 weeks because I thought it was just too cumbersome It is not word based so none of my autocorrect shortcuts would transfer I would have to buy a whole new shortcut program and there was no way to have the cursor jump to the voice

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