Docs and punctuation

Regarding the posts down the list about the docs who dictate run-on sentences or add bunches of periods, etc.  I am wondering why they are not instructed to not include punctuation at all.  Our company has us disregard what they say anyway (since it is usually way off), and it seems they are making it extra rough on themselves.

I have one who says comma practically every other word.  It really threw me off at first, but now I hardly even hear it (so used to ignoring it).  But think how much easier it would be for them to not even think about it.  What works the best is when they just use their voice inflection to signal the end of one thought/subject and the beginning of another.  Being someone without a whole lot of medical background, it gets confusing when they don't.

Why is it no one seems to communicate with the dictators about such things? 

• Docs and punctuation - Cali
  • Ugh - JustMe
    • Who - JustMe
  • because they are of the Gods and thus smarter than you, and - anon
  • I have one who never fails to disappoint me... - PAMT~MDM
  • I agree!.... - EvaEv
    • Right! - Cali

The messages you are viewing are archived/old.
To view latest messages and participate in discussions, select the boards given in left menu

 I told him to clean the area with hydrogen peroxide, and, after that, he can apply the Neosporin ointment. 

How would the punctuation be on this sentence?  Did I do it right? 

Thanks in advance for the help..

HI,

  I am taking my medical transcription course through Allied Schools. I am having a problem trying to punctuate the dictations properly. I would like to know if anyone can help me with this problem. What I thought was proper punctuation seems to be different with medical transcription. Are we supposed to transcribe the punctuation as the doctor dictates or correct it to what we believe is correct?

   Also, I have an assignment that I just transcribed that is impossible for me to punctuate. If anyone can help me, I would truely appreciate it.

I was very careful about punctuation until I had to research things and found that the MTs at my hospital NEVER use commas. I could barely understand some of the long, strung out sentences. I always researched obscure medical terms to make sure my work was accurate, yet I make $10 less an hour than others there because the pools are set up so some MTs get the profitable work before the rest of us. The point of this is, I don't feel that my excellent work is appreciated, and I don't believe the pool situation is fair, so I just do minimum to get by.  I also work IC to supplement my income,  and my IC work is much better because I feel appreciated.

I have MS Word 2003. This program has always capitalized the first letter after a colon (:) and for some reason today it stopped. I cannot figure this out for the life of me. I have been in Tools, etc, and see nothing that addresses this problem. If anyone has had this problem and knows how to correct it, please enlighten me. LOL

TYIA

Should I leave it up to the doctors to add their punctation for this verbatim account?  Not putting commas around the word "however" is driving me crazy!

That is SO true!!!!  There is definitely a problem with dictating the appropriate gender when it comes to ESL docs. They tend to go back and forth umpteen times during one dictation, so you really have to pay attention.  Verb tense can also get very confusing.

I agree that sometimes slowing down and concentrating can actually increase productivity. Even though I feel like I'm transcribing like a tortoise, I'm really getting more done than I think when I slow down and allow myself to think.

Just hang in there with QA. They are just doing their job and you need to take a good look at what they are telling you and concentrate on that issue. It's really hard not to take it personally, that's for sure, but it's gonna make you a better Transcriptionist in the long run. On the other hand, if you feel they are truly wrong about an important issue, then challenge them!!  But you'd better have major references to back up your challenge.

Ellen S.

if they even know the English language to begin with, 'cause if they do, they don't practice it.

read the reports after we have transcribed them, but I just had a doc on my account dictate that he wanted the line "Dictated but not read" added to ALL of his reports from now on.  He was mad because he said he requested this to be done a few weeks ago and has been "keeping track" and it hasn't been getting done.

Amazing.

I switched companies and along with my new account came all new PAs (and might I add, quite a few of them) who all make me miserable. They botch the dictations beyond belief and I am left to fix the sentences which look like riddles and are actually confusing after they get done with it.

Change thoughts in the middle of a sentence...start talking and forget where they left off so I am sitting there for another 2 minutes waiting through the ummms and ahhhs and the start of sentences "the patient umm.... ahhh" and I'm waiting for them to say something and they just hang up.

Mine are good for this too... they will dictate an incomplete report and then a few dictations after they will start finishing incomplete dictations, adding in something they forgot to say, or they will say CC a copy to: Dr. ____  on a 4 second report and not say whose report it goes on. This would be easy to figure out if they didnt have 40 dictations and at least 5 hang-ups with about 8 of those 40 dictations being something they want added on to some nameless patient's report.

Had I not switched jobs, I would have had a hard time believing any PA was hard to transcribe...just because I had a good bit of them on my other account and they were all PERFECT speakers.

Now when I see that I have to transcribe a PA-- 

...and I transcribe and read my own reports (I work for a large healthcare co).  Hubby signed a HIPAA form for me to transcribe and read his reports, too.   Now the docs are more careful 

When I mention to physicians that if they send their work out it might be sent overseas they are appalled!  Sometimes they say things like, "So that's why there were so many mistakes."  Companies don't always tell them where the work is being done or by whom. 

I still fault them for trying to save money at our expense, but in a certain sense some of them are being taken advantage of as well.  Perhaps our "enemies" could turn out to be our best allies should a good case make it to Court TV. 

We need to educate the physicians as well as the public. 

I guess it gives them the right to charge PREMIUM prices,  although I

think ER prices are quite pricey enough.  My friends trip through the ER

the other night was a cool $10,000 and all she got was an aspirin.  (she thought

she was having a heart attack and it was GERD.  But to rule it out they gave her

the works; CT scan, CXR, blood work, cardiac enzymes......and on top of that came the doctors (including the cardiologist, oh my) bill.

yeah, and that's why I'm here typing and they're out on their yacht somewhere, right?    But I do try to diagnose, even did this when I worked for a doc in the back office.  And sometimes I was actually right!

They absolutely don't care about quality or any of that jazz, which is why I have always wondered why we as an industry keep beating each other up over issues that doctors couldn't care less about. Not that I think we should all just transcribe any old way we want, but it seems like we act like the slaves out in the mud pit slapping each other around about how much or how little straw to use for the bricks while the slavedriver sits on the side line with the whip completely content with end product either way.

I suppose the answer most would give is that we should take pride in the quality of our work whether they (the doctors) do or not, but I can't get passed the notion that these are the same individuals that the powers that be seem so intent on pleasing and are also the same individuals who would see us all in the soup lines tomorrow looking for the next homeless shelter to sleep in if they had their way. They (the medical profession) will not think twice about putting all transcriptionists out of business at their first opportunity, and yet we as an industry continue to bow to their ridiculous and uninformed demands concerning how to do what we do or their complaints about how much we charge or that we shouldn't charge for line count generated by short forms or macros, etc. They have no clue how many times their butts get saved by transcriptionists on a daily basis.

I've never met a transcriptionist who wouldn't readily agree with the notion that we are part of the health care team, and yet many of us continue to act like we still work for the doctors instead of the patient. Oh well, go figure.

Just venting as well.

without your consent, if they are not considered standard and will probably have to be paid for by the patient out of pocket, unless the patient agrees to pay either up front or if the charge is denied.  At least that's been my experience! Good luck, I hate insurance companies, too!

Isn't she cute? 

I have one doctor who, when she wants to correct something or other always says "This is an aside to the typist." ARGH. I feel like I'm in a Shakespeare play or something - don't those have a lot of "asides"? I always want to scream at her "Don't you know I'm not a TYPIST?? I'M A MEDICAL TRANSCRIPTIONIST, DAMN IT!!!!" Of course she's 80 or something so I shall forever be "the typist" to her.

I have a resident who always says "For transcriptionist, would you...." to get my attention - but when he was new I thought he was saying "Poor transcriptionist..." I always nodded my head in sad agreement until I realized what he was actually saying....

And then there's the doc who loves to complain about his job to me, sometimes in great detail - "Here I sit, waiting for some x-rays to come in so I can make a buck" and "I cannot believe this hospital."

They crack me up!

think for some reason you know exactly what they are going to dictate for ROS so they just basically babble right through it and take a big deep breath at the end.

Or the one like I had today that sounded completely wasted off his butt and even with the speed up or down it still sounded like a drunken drawl. It was ridiculous. It was also dicatated later on Thanksgiving night, so who knows? Maybe doc had a few too many rounds of Thanksgiving cheer and then thought, "Ow thith, I thstill gottsa do my dictatheen."

Report them to your supervisor. It's worked for me in a few cases. It's up to them to pass the word along that the dictator needs to slow down.

I had one guy that I do locally on tapes that suddenly decided that he was going to take his machine and dictate on his way home in the car.  I don't think so pal. I called my local boss and said I wasn't going to do it. His tapes have been clear as a bell ever since because he's doing them in the office again.