Article Manager posted on February 18, 2010 08:28
Doctor's are busy professionals. They are knowledgeable experts in a special subject area and in high demand. But they are human.
Have you ever read a doctor's handwriting? It's not very legible, is it?
The reason doctors have a bad reputation for their penmanship is because they write a lot of little notes every day. And they are very busy. When you do that much writing and you have such high demand on your time, you do the little things that you do most often in a hurry. No harm is done. Except that one little misprint, typo or mishap can lead to someone getting diagnosed improperly or prescribed a medication that could harm them.
Plus, when you add the pitfall of costing an insurance company more money to unravel the mystery of why Person A ended up with Drug B, which costs more than Drug C, then you have a real mess. That's where the qualified medical transcriptionist comes in.
Your job as the medical transcriptionist is to dictate correctly what the doctor has administered. That requires some heavy knowledge of the subject matter. You have to decipher the doctor's handwriting, but more importantly, you have to interpret his true intentions. That requires a good eye, but more than just a good eye. Knowledge, experience and attention to detail are key.
If you think you can handle the challenges of the medical transcriptionist then you should take an online medical transcription course and get qualified to save those professional reputations.