Time and cost pressures are constantly increasing in the Swiss healthcare system. Every week, doctors invest several hours in medical documentation alone. In addition, doctors working in privatepractices work an average of 5.8 hours of overtime per week – and as much as 7.4 hours for doctors in acute care (1). This burden not only affects doctors mentally but also pushes into the background what originally motivated many of them to choose this profession: working with patients (2).
High pressure in everyday life
The fictional example of Dr Hofer, a specialist in orthopaedics, shows how this increasing pressure can have a concrete impact on everyday medical practice. He has been working in a group practice with ten doctors for six years. His daily work routine is characterised by follow-up appointments after acute injuries, caring for chronically ill long-term patients, emergencies, telephone calls to discuss external imaging – and a considerable amount of administrative work. Every day, he faces the challenge of meeting the expectations of his patients, his team, his family and, last but not least, his own.
But he does not always succeed in this balancing act. In his already busy schedule, unpredictable situations arise on a regular basis. For example, Dr Hofer may have to take over a patient from his colleague at short notice. However, if the last appointment was not too long ago, the report has often not yet been transcribed and only a few handwritten notes are available. He then must obtain the missing information by telephone while the next patient is already waiting in the waiting room. This can result in delays and a suboptimal consultation experience. The consultation schedule is somewhat disrupted, and Dr Hofer is only able to complete the urgent insurance reports once the waiting room has cleared. Since dictation is only possible directly at his workplace, he often misses dinner with his family on such days.
Speech recognition as a concrete relief
Unfortunately, this kind of everyday routine is no exception for doctors in the Swiss healthcare system. That’s why we offer solutions that address this issue and provide noticeable relief.
One of these is Dragon Medical One for Windows operating systems: a powerful, always-available and highly secure speech recognition solution. From the very first dictation, users benefit from impressively accurate recognition. Texts can be dictated directly into the clinic or practice information system – quickly, reliably and without detours.
We also offer a solution for macOS: Voicepoint Helium® makes the personal voice profile from Dragon Medical One available across systems – ideal, for example, for doctors who work in a group practice with a macOS and in a hospital with a Windows operating system. Thanks to the combination of Dragon Medical One and Voicepoint Helium®, the working environment remains the same everywhere: all dictionaries, auto-text functions and individual vocabulary are available on both systems – fully synchronised and ready for immediate use.
The theory sounds promising – but how much relief do the solutions really provide? Concrete figures make the added value tangible:
| Effort required for manual transcription without speech recognition | Effort with Dragon Medical One / Voicepoint Helium® | |
| 1 report | Approx. 16 minutes | Approx. 4 minutes |
| 1 day | Approx. 240 minutes | Approx. 60 minutes |
| 1 week | Approx. 20 hours | Approx. 5 hours |
| 1 month | Approx. 75 hours | Approx. 19 hours |
| 1 year | Approx. 38 days | Approx. 9 days |
Our speech recognition solutions offer much more: shortcuts, text modules and voice commands can be used to further speed up the documentation process and adapt it to individual work styles. The following examples illustrate how this can work in practice:
- Shortcuts: To avoid having to constantly press the record button on the dictation device during long dictations, you can start and stop the dictation using the plus key on the keyboard. This function is stored as a shortcut/key combination by default. If you would like to use a different key for this, you can add it as a shortcut in the settings.
- Voice commands: To move the cursor within the dictation window or directly in the practice or clinic information system without a mouse or keyboard, you can use voice commands such as “start sentence”, “start paragraph” or “end paragraph” to move the cursor directly.
- Text modules: For repetitive text passages, it is possible to store text modules including placeholders for individual values. For example, the start of an operation can be stored as standard text. If the command “OP start text knee TP” is then dictated, the text you have predefined appears, for example: “Supine position. Disinfection and sterile draping in the usual manner. Ioban film. Antibiotic prophylaxis with cefuroxime 30 minutes preoperatively i.v., weight-adjusted. Correct execution of the team time-out. Thigh tourniquet with 250 mmHg. Median skin incision. Medial arthrotomy.”
The added value of these solutions in everyday work can once again be seen in the example of Dr Hofer.
Once again, he takes over a patient from his colleague at short notice. He opens the patient file and finds the complete report – dictated with Dragon Medical One immediately after the last appointment. All relevant information is available, clearly formulated and immediately accessible. There is no need for further enquiries, and the consultation can begin without delay. Dr Hofer also completes the rest of the documentation during the consultation. Between two appointments, he dictates the insurance reports directly into the practice information system, without any additional steps or loss of time. The insurance correspondence is completed before the last patient leaves the practice.
Today, Dr. Hofer finishes his working day together with the team. Today, Dr Hofer finishes his working day together with the team. He arrives home on time to have dinner with his family.
Talking instead of writing – in minutes instead of hours. Start your journey into the future of documentation today.
We look forward to hearing from you.
References
(1) Administrative workload for doctors continues to rise (fmh.ch)
(2) Young hospital doctors are working at their limits (tagesanzeiger.ch)