Medical Dictation

Medical dictation is a special form of dictation due to the specialized vocabulary involved.

The medical field has its own special vocabulary, acronyms and  abbreviations.  In order to produce quick and accurate text reproductions, the person or software doing the transcribing must be capable of translating the specialized speech without errors.   Accuracy in medical dictation is paramount.  A patient’s well-being, or indeed their life may be affected by errors or omissions in the transcription process.  If specialized software is used to transcribe the speech, it must be capable of recognizing the specialized medical jargon used in the medical field.

Dictation can be defined as the act or manner of saying or reading something for another to transcribe or for a machine to record.   In addition, we can say that dictation is the act or manner of transcribing words uttered by another.

In other words, we are discussing the two sides of the transcription process.  On the one hand, the speaker is providing the words to be written, and on the other hand, someone or something is reproducing the words in written form or recorded form (such as a digital or magnetic recording).  The speaker dictates the message, and the person doing the transcribing ‘’takes dictation”.

Let’s look at a few examples.

• A nurse may record a description of a patient’s condition into a Dictaphone machine.  Later, someone else can listen to the recording, and transcribe the speech into written text.

• A doctor may speak directly to the individual doing the transcribing.  The individual listening to the doctor can write or type the information into a written form.

• A medical professional may speak into a microphone connected to a portable computer inside the examining room.  As the medical professional speaks,  she can see the text being produced by the medical dictation software.  In this case, the medical dictation software is acting as the transcriber, and converting the spoken word of the doctor into written text on the computer.

Medical dictation as described in the above scenarios are happening thousands of times a day throughout the United States and indeed, throughout the world.  Many different types of scenarios could be described,  but hopefully the ones described above give you an idea of how the process typically works.

Usually, the person that transcribes the text will be a trained medical transcriptionist (MT).  The job of a medical transcriptionist and the training required to be a medical transcriptionist is described in other areas of this site.

With the vast improvements in speech recognition technology, medical dictation software has become an indispensable tool in many medical establishments.  Medical dictation software is also discussed in other areas of this site.

In the area of medical dictation software, the product known as Dragon Medical has become one of the premier products currently available to assist medical professionals in their dictation needs.  Dragon Medical is described in its own area of this site.  See the menu if you are interested.