Speech recognition has improved by leaps and bounds in recent years, with even home PCs now able to accurately transcribe what users are saying. But some of the more interesting advances are taking place in the enterprise field, as sophisticated speech software is combined with collaboration apps. The video below shows a demonstration of an integrated eClinicalWorks 8 and Dragon 10 Medical application. Nuance's Dragon 10 Medical allows doctors or other health professionals to dictate exam notes or other data into the records system with what appears to be a very high degree of accuracy. For instance, 99% of the population would have no idea how to handle terms like "echocardiogram" or "dobutamine nuclear stress test" yet the system below handled both with ease.As you can imagine, typing out the dictation would be far more labor-intensive.
But the spoken data can be leveraged in even more ways once it enters eClinicalWorks. It can easily be shared with other users in the healthcare practice -- for instance, other doctors who are assigned to the same patient and need to review the patient's health history, or clerical staff who need to export a portion of the patient's records. The system also has several Internet-enabled elements. Offices which don't want to install eClinicalWorks on the premises can opt for access as a software-as-a-service (however, Dragon 10 Medical has to be locally installed). eClinicalWorks also has a Web portal for patients, which lets them use passwords to access their own lab results and doctors' reports, as well as communicate with physicians and nurse practitioners.
Note that these types of setups are not cheap. Nuance's PR representative passed along the pricing for just the speech recognition costs:
Nuance sells Dragon Medical either as a box which is often purchased by small practices, or Dragon Medical can be purchases as a software license, in which organizations pay per named user. The third option for a Dragon Medical purchase is for healthcare organizations with 50 or more physicians; this is an enterprise purchase in which all staff has the capability to use Dragon Medical. Dragon is $1,599.99 per user for a license. Professional service fees range from $500-1200 dollars per user, although this cost varies depending on organization size and complexity.
We did not get pricing for eClinicalWorks. Still, many doctors see EHR systems as essential for running their practices, and speech recognition software is a tool that may help them realize other efficiencies relating to staff costs and their own time management.
Video: Dragon 10 Medical used in eClinicalWorks v8
Image: CJ Sorg/flickr (creative commons commercial use license)
Sources: eClinicalWorks and Dragon 10 Medical product pages and press release, YouTube, email with Nuance PR representative.
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Regarding the cost, it's worth mentioning that the average cost of transcription per doctor, per month in the U.S. is anywhere between $3,000 - $5,000, if Dragon Medical helps physicians to go transcription free and create medical reports in real-time thet cost of speech recogntion can be regained in as little as 1-2 months.
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