Medical transcription outsourcing: Providing support for medico-legal documentation needs

Medical transcription has been providing valuable support to the healthcare sector by faithfully documenting the patient- healthcare professional encounter in its entirety. The process of medical transcription becomes even more efficient and economic by outsourcing medical transcription. Outsourced medical transcription services are able to meet all the required standards of medical transcription like accuracy, turnaround time, security and being cost effective as medical transcription is the core business of the service provider and all the resources of the service provider are focused towards providing quality services.

Another aspect that medical transcription services aid in is the medico-legal aspects of healthcare facilities by creating comprehensive and accurate patient records. In an increasing litigious environment complete patient records are vital as evidence in case of malpractice suits.

Medical transcription helps in medico-legal aspects by

• Properly recording and documenting patient's current and past medical history
• Helping document the rationale surrounding the medical reasonableness of the treatment
• Documenting necessity of all patient diagnostic testing administered
• Providing sufficient basis to reconstruct, fully justify and explain the facts and circumstances giving rise to the patients' condition and course of treatment
• Ensuring that the patient case history contained in the clinic file for the patient will become the centerpiece of any litigation and/or claims negotiations regarding the reasonableness and necessity of the treatment and diagnostic testing by capturing all the details completely and accurately.

Documentation usually reflects a course of treatment; increased emphasis on proper documentation provides proper safeguards against malpractice claims. Proper documentation of the patient- healthcare professional encounter has the following advantages:

1.      Increase the quality of patient care by recognizing accelerated or prolonged symptoms leading to further investigation

2.      Provides justification for patient care, by reflecting detail and capturing objective physical examination findings that support the course of treatment. This aspect of documentation also helps in claiming payments

3.      Proper documentation helps in increasing referrals to the healthcare professional by reflecting on his/ her ability to provide quality care

4.      Protection against litigation.

It can be seen that outsourcing to a medical transcription service provider who believes that maintaining quality and security of documentation as their priority helps the healthcare facility in many ways.

To ensure quality documentation of the patient- healthcare professional encounter, the medical transcription service provider needs to be assessed on criteria like:

• Accuracy: This means the percentage of accuracy of the completed transcripts vis-à-vis what was dictated. A minimum of 99% and above would be acceptable.

• Turnaround time: Turnaround time refers to the time taken to revert the transcribed report to the healthcare facility. A turnaround time of not more than 24 hours for normal reports and 4-12 hours for STAT reports would be considered ideal.

• Data security: The service provider being outsourced to should be HIPAA and HITECH compliant. The medical transcription service provider has to have adequate security measures to ensure that the confidential data transmitted back and forth is safe and secure.

• Pricing: This is one of the main benefits that a healthcare facility hopes to have, from the outsourcing option. Pricing should be fair and reasonable for the services rendered. Pricing method should also be transparent and simple so that both parties can verify the same at any stage of the process

• Technology: The technology used by the medical transcription service provider should not only secure but should also be easy to use, without having to require extensive training.

As documentation of patient- healthcare professional is vital for protection in the medico-legal aspects, choosing the right medical transcription service provider is vital.

TransDyne, a leader in the outsourced medical transcription industry has been providing medical transcription services for over a decade. TransDyne offers quality medical transcription at reasonable prices, executed by experienced and qualified medical transcriptionists with a very quick turnaround time executed through secure HIPAA and HITECH compliant channels, with very high levels of accuracy and all this with technology that is advanced but easy to use!               

To avail outsourced medical transcription services from TransDyne, click here.