Here is my understanding of conversions of time dictated to transcribed
Posted By: cai on 2008-06-02
In Reply to: I have been give 300 minutes of dictation... - MT stressed!
I was told once that the ratio of dictated to transcribed minutes was approximately 1:4 for an average MT for average dictation. So, if you've been given 300 minutes of dictation it might take you 1200 minutes to finish it, divided by 60 minutes equals about 20 hours. Obviously this is just an estimate and could very depending on a lot of factors, but this might give you some idea.
Another conversion I've heard is that one 65-character line equals 6 seconds of audio and so 1 minute of audio equals 10 lines. So, if you are charging by 65-character line, you may be looking at 3000 lines or so, which when using the above formula would have you typing at about 150 lines per hour for 20 hours, giving you about 3000 lines.
Sounds like this is very doable, typing for 7-8 hours per day if you have until the end of Wednesday. If it has to be back by Wednesday morning, you will have to work 10+ hours per day on it today and tomorrow.
;)
Christine
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I have transcribed for doctors in the past who have dictated...sm
that the patient is heterosexual. I'm not much on what is politically correct or not, I just transcribe what the doctor dictates.
I have a hard time understanding if this was so
wrong then why wouldn't anyone not even your own husband be on your side? I don't know about this one. Something doesn't sound right. JMO.
I'm having a hard time understanding why you
That doesn't make sense to me. Just because you transcribe a report, that doesn't make you the only person who knows about it or even a significant person in the whole process.
You know, I have a heck of a time understanding sm
music lyrics to rock songs or anything that has loud instrumentals playing with the vocals. Go figure.
My grandmother transcribed part time into her mid 70s.
,
anyone paid by the amount of time dictated?
I am being paid by the line right now, but my office is switching to a completely new system that counting lines would be a nightmare.
The doc has suggested maybe paying me by the amount of time dictated.
Has anyone done this before, and if so what are the pros and cons, and what is a reasonable rate??? I have NO idea!
Thanks so much for any info.
I have been with them for seven years this September and never raised my rates, which I brought up to him while speaking about the new system saying I would hope whatever we decide is more than I make now!
metric conversions help please
how does one convert mL/mg%
If you have not transcribed using BOS
guidelines that is probably the problem. See which version they are using and get a copy.
and this is how our records are transcribed =(
x
I have not strictly transcribed in about 10 yrs.sm
I work full-time doing medical transcription but I also have other duties that do not involve transcribing so I don't keep up with lines or anything like that; I get paid by the hour. I have worked 3-4 hours in the evenings for one of the national companies for a little over a month but I can't seem to get my line count up. I've only been able to do around 100 lph. I know it will take longer than it would if I worked 8 hours just transcribing. I would like to quit the other job and just work from home transcribing but I'm afraid if I can't get my line count up I won't be able to maintain my current income. I'm not a blazing fast typist, I probably type 75-80 wpm without any kind of expanders. Any helpful advice or encouragement on whether you guys think at my typing speed it is within reason to think I can make it to 150-200 lph? I've done straight transcription in the past but I never had to keep up with lines. I have 30+ years of experience. I just need to decide whether to keep things the way they are now or take the chance on income by production only. BYW, I transcribe acute care for the national.
That was my understanding, too.
I appreciate the information. This is exactly what my friend says is deducted from her SE check at MQ.
it is my understanding
The long gas lines were only in the north, i.e. NY, where I was living at the time and remember things vividly.
It's fun to get out of your car, ready to deliver, and there are about 50 cars ahead of you. People are like, "Get her to the front of the line, fast!!!" 
my understanding is this
If you work exclusively for *one* service, the IRS classifies you as a statutory employee (services pays employers share of your SS tax). If you have your own account, even one (i.e. local doctor), you are an independent contractor.
But as an independent contractor ... you call the shots. You can work for 20 services if you want. You work on "contract" rather than production. You're not locked into, say, 1200 lines per day. But the service can say, "You are responsible for meeting the 24-hour turnaround for St Katrina Hospital."
You can't go by the 20 questions ... too many variable, especially as it pertains to who has the element of control.
Best solution ... talk to someone at the Small Business Administration. These people are former business owners, and some have been also been connected with the IRS.
thank you for understanding...
That sounds more like my way of doing things. It would be the best way, rather than just closing down and shutting her off. You're right, it would sever our relationship completely, or kill her inside, if I were completely up front. She is dependent on this man, and she is so afraid of being alone. Its a delicate subject better handled the way you suggested.
my understanding
for many, MANY years is that the state abbreviations are two capital letters. These abbreviations are for postal services, so having it written otherwise on a job application may be okay. Unless the job is with the post office ;-)
And thank you for understanding ; ) nm
x
Thanks for understanding
Wow! You have been on that long? I still have several hours to go. Thanks for understanding. I love your icons, I agree with the thud specifically. Not to pun, but maybe today the "turkeys" dictate LOL. I could say something about us not being chicken to transcribe today but that would be too much! OK so, I am going loony, with these dictators who wouldn't! LOL.
it is my understanding
that noise-blocking headphones can actually block out dictation, esp if there is noise up close (ie, xrays flapping) that makes the dictation comparable to background sound.
If I am understanding
your post correctly, you just have your keyboard sitting on your desk. If that is correct, I would say you need a keyboard tray. When your hands are on your keys, your arms should be bent at the elbows and straight to your keys ... your forearms should not angled up or down.
I use a keyboard tray and, in fact, had to add spacers to lower it even more, as I am tall and have long arms. Just over an inch extra (lower) made all the difference in the world! I was having a lot of trouble with my right hand being weak and extensor muscle soreness, causing me to have trouble gripping my mouse (also phone and various other things).
A little bit can go a long way!
My understanding...
is that you need to determine which 3 categories your expenses fall under: Direct, indirect, or unrelated. If the expense is indirect, which I would consider Internet since it is used for purposes besides MT, then it would be deducted as a percentage based upon what I posted above. If your Internet is used solely for your business, then it should be deducted differently, 100%. OP, I think your best bet is to speak to a tax professional regarding this. No one on this site can give you 100% reliable tax information for your particular situation.
Understanding VR/SR
Google front-end speech recognition and/or back-end speech recognition and it'll help you understand how some of this stuff works. The site below was interesting and helpful to me. I found it by Googling back-end speech recognition. One is when the Dr doesn't even know he/she is on a VR system and one is where the Dr does most of the training/editing. The site name doesn't seem to be coming up as a valid site on my message but you don't need to put www in front of the name. http://speechrecognition.wordpress.com/
Your transcribed report would be your testimony, if anybody, for whatever SM
bizarre reason decided your input would be needed. Why the heck do you think you'd get called to court?
I got charged $75 for a copy of my old MRs, even though I transcribed it!!! n/m
:p
QA Help: Earlier I transcribed a report where
the doctor used a really offensive curse phrase. He was actually quoting what the patient said (ER report). He said place this in quotes. It was a really ugly thing to say (mother F word). Even though it's in quotes as what the patient apparently said, I felt uncomfortable actually transcribing it. And believe me I'm no prude. I've heard it all (and said some of it). However, it just seemed really unprofessional and not appropriate in a medical document. It's not like it was a psych report. In fact, it really had no relevance whatsoever, in my opinion, but I could be wrong I guess. So, I left a blank. But now I'm thinking, was that really not my call? Should I have just transcribed it? What would any of you out there have done? QA? What do you advise in cases like this? It's happened before but never as filthy as this. 
Contact the clients you transcribed for
n/m
VA accts transcribed offshore
My first editing job was for a company located in Virginia that has since closed and one of their largest accounts was for a network of VA Hospitals. I always wondered if they (the VA) had any clue that the actual transcription was being done in India.
It is 10 reports transcribed for free.
The OP states the account goes through transcriptionists. I wonder why? The OP states later on in the thread they go through transcriptionists.
I'm trying to protect Lisa from getting abused from the get-go. All she has to say is "my charge is" and go from there.
Too bad if they were already transcribed. Does that mean Lisa should take the loss? NO. Absolutely not.
Again, read above where the OP states "they can't seem to keep a transcriptionist."
To the OP: Charge them! You won't regret it. If you are an IC, you have every right to charge them.
Plus, look at rockinMT's post. She bent over backwards for an account and what happened? It turns out she was spending more time than it was worth.
These are all my opinions, and I am trying to give my opinion on what the OP should do in regards to reports that she transcribed and should, yes, be paid for since she was not aware ahead of time and especially because it is a new account.
What do I know? Ya know? I mean really? Just looking out for the best interest of the OP, but hey, that's just me.
The reports that are transcribed get scanned into
the EMR record. They do the same thing with the lab slips, x-ray reports, etc. The transcription is still performed in the usual way it has always been done.
I have transcribed from handwritten notes
and it was a nightmare. Sometimes the info was missing and my neck hurt like heck looking down and up, down and up. I charged per page. This dr went from dictating to these 5 page forms that he would fill out when he saw the patient. He scribbled and it was horrible. It wrecked my neck, so I gave it up. I was better off straight transcribing at lower pay than when I had to keep looking up and down from a page and no a stand for the forms didn't help because my eyes kept leaving the monitor, so it was hard to get back in gear only to have to take my eyes back to the handwritten form.
MTs by definition are hired to transcribed - sm
what the doctor dictates. We can't be expected to have to catch their mistakes - they're supposed to catch their own. That's why they're being paid the big bucks and we're note. Years back, we weren't expected to know all this stuff -- the meaning of every word we transcribed, the normal/abnormal lab values, what a particular drug is used for, and I could go on and on, and we were paid better, appreciated more & respected more.
I do agree that we must know how to spell medical words and words of English usage. That's what they get for their 7-8-8.5 cents per line. I do NOT believe that we should have to look up doctor's names, on our time, when the dictator has it right in front of him/her and would take him/her only 2-3 seconds to spell it, thus also avoiding any confusion. But I guess that would be too easy.
I didn't always feel this way. Years back, when I was treated as a professional and compensated accordingly, I performed as such. If I want to flag a doc's mistake, I do it for the PATIENT'S sake (but for the grace of God it could be me or a loved one lying in that hospital bed) - and as a courtesy to the doctor. But they really expect too much for too little.
Hunting Understanding II
Thank you to all ladies on this board that feed their families the OLD FASHION WAY! They don't just buy any old meat in the store with a label on it! HA!HA!HA!
totally not understanding
I am totally not understanding what you are looking for then. Avg line counts per hour depend on your own speed, but I know many places require 125-150 lines/hr.
MT work is ridiculous because there is no one standard for line counting - gross lines, 65 char w/sp, 65 char w/o sp, 55 char w/o sp, per report. Totally absurd!! So that all counts in factoring how many lines.
What are you not understanding about my post??....sm
I am not saying that all NM businesses are bad. For goodness sake, I'm talking about Quixtar and Quixtar ONLY, not the entire network marketing industry.
understanding jobs...
AMEN!!! Try telling that to my husband and family!! I work at home, but just because I am "at home" doesn't mean I am "home."
Understanding the basics.
First, it would help if you understood the basic terminology. Spend some time reading the Help file in Word. Simply put, you insert the information, give it a bookmark name, and then insert a reference to that bookmark in the correct location(s) throughout your document. Jumping between the fields is something that you do using a form; more info on that in the Word help files. There's just too much information to post here. Spend some time playing around with it before making your template. (There are a couple are other options that you may come across that may help to automate your work for you, like the ASK field.)
Also With A Non-Understanding Hubby
I understand completely! It took me a couple of years to start making good money, and it wasn't until recently when I jumped ship from the large MTSO that I was working for and joined a smaller, private company that I really started making the big $$. In first learning these new accounts, I was working 15- to 18-hour days, but now about 3 months later, I've got it down to an 8-hour day and I'm hitting right at $950 per week!
I think the key is finding the situation that works best for you. I have decided that the smaller companies work best for me. I started out with one and then went to a larger company for the increased benefits, but then I found that I actually worked less because of the 'motivation factor.' When there are 100 other people working on the same account as me, I tend to feel less important and I don't work as quickly. However, when I have my own accounts and I know that I'm the only one in charge of getting it done, then I find that I can sit here longer and work harder and faster, and I also don't get distracted as easily.
However, my husband does often complain about my hours. He's been used to me working from home for over 7 years now, and he doesn't like the idea of me working outside of the house. I know that may sound bad, but he's just used to knowing that I'm at home with the kids and we're all in one piece. (I think it's because he travels a lot and he likes to know that his family isn't also scattered around.)
He likes that I am able to work from home, but he would like it even better if I worked just from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and then still have my mornings and evenings to cook and clean and sew buttons on shirts...or whatever it is that he has in his head that a housewife does. I have to keep reminding him that I am a 'wife who works from the house,' but I am not a 'housewife.'
And although his paycheck nearly doubles mine, I still have to remind him from time to time that my paycheck is equally as important. It gives me my own personal confidence AND it provides for vacations, shopping trips, etc. In addition to being able to provide for extras, I’m also flexible for when his job relocates him (which has happened 3 times in the last 5 years). I’m waiting on his promotion that will take us to Florida—hopefully in about 3 more years. I’ve told him that if I didn’t have the job that I have, then we wouldn’t just be able to pick up and move whenever his job needed us to.
Anyway, don’t let his insecurities and disbeliefs discourage you! It won’t be long before you’ll be able to prove what you’re capable of. And even then, you’ll probably still have to remind him what it’s all for about once a year or so! I don’t think that argument will ever go away! Happy Holidays!!
I am not understanding- is that including
our changing, adding, etc. to get the finished report? in other words - if a VR report starts at 87 before our editing, and we have to put in say 3 extra lines, does it still stay at 87 when all is finished? Thanks.
I may not be understanding correctly but
If you want to go backwards with the jump code I think that is shift+F11. I never have been able to get that to work correctly, but I can hit F11 and go forward in the document just fine.
My understanding is that some can do exceptional
line rates on certain platforms. My understanding is that Escription has speech compression technology that will allow the speech to be played at a faster rate without resorting to chipmonk voices. I have heard of people doing 600-800 lph consistently with that platform, even 1200 on occasion if you get a good streak going. I've not used Escription, the only VR experience I have is with Dictaphone's Turbo speech product and there are some who use that and produce 500 lph over a 40-hour week; however, they are not able to do that consistently. My issue with speech is that you tend to get on autopilot and you don't have the same brain control as far as hearing the words and having them flow through your fingertips, making you in control of what is coming out. It is way to easy to "think" that you are reading what you are hearing. Also, it's much easier to rely on the speech to have put out the correct spelling on something you're not sure about. Transcriptionists are much more likely to look up something that they don't know when the word is not already staring at them on the screen. It can make us more productive, but it also compromises the integrity of the finished product. However, it's really hard to put the worms back in the can after they have already been opened up. What troubles me the most is that the organization that is supposed to promote and support our industry and it's workers seems much more interested in jumping into bed with the MTSOs and the employers than their members. I am so consciencious about my work. My knowledge is worth something. Accurately delivering a timely quality document is worth much more to the revenue cycle than it is given credit for. I have absolutely no doubt that I could much more easily be taught to code the finished report than a coder could be taught to accurately transcribe the report, yet they are given much more respect because they are ultimately responsible for the revenue. However, without me doing my job to the best of my ability....there is nothing their for them to work from. Okay....I'm off topic now. Sorry about that. The whole ASR/EMR (point and click) stuff has me ready to pull out my hair. If you want to really see an ugly, inaccurate, and highly unprofessional report....look for one that a doctor, NP, or PA has created for themselves. Nothing is capitalized, spelled correctly, or punctuated as it should be. The whole dern thing process needs to be looked at, analyzed, and the MTs who don't have the skills need to be weeded out or have some retraining. The knowledge and the understanding of what we do (for those who take pride in what goes out with their initials on it) needs to be recognized for the value that it adds to the revenue process AND we need to be compensated accordingly.
Not understanding why you are working
because you are surely not making any money with only 700+ lines a day. Just to be at home when the kids get home? Who pays for their upkeep? A platform, good acct and good paying jobs will exclude people who are not able to be on course with the others out there. You have to be fast if nothing else working in this profession. I think you might have missed your calling at some other profession.
I swear, I just transcribed Bill Cosby! sm
you know that voice that Bill Cosby does, kinda sounds like he's drunk? Well, this doc I just transcribed sounded like that!!! and it's workers' comp, no less. Just had to vent a little! It's still too early for all this! 
Not an MQ employee but have always transcribed via turnaround pool.
The office manager I worked for set it up so they could bill faster, i.e., ERs in 24 hours or less, op notes, discharge summaries, etc. She said it made for a better cash flow for the hospital. That's probably what MQ is trying to accomplish, maybe per client request.
Well, I just transcribed 1500 lines in 3 hours. sm
I work on the same account every day, same dictators, lots of templated reports I did myself and put them into auto correct. I get up early, start at 7 am and today I was done by 10 am. Cleaning the house now. Also, the line pay is slightly higher than most, so 1500 lines is fine for me today.
On harder days when the account is really behind, I get up and vacuum the house after 3 hours of transcribing then come back for 1 hour. If things are caught up, I stop for the day. If not, I will go back in the evening.
I can't sit for 6-8 hours straight. Making $160 bucks in 3 hours is good for me and enough. Tomorrow is another day!
Use templates and short cuts - that will help! I have whole reports in my auto correct, but you have to listen through and change and correct things as each patient is a different case.
I do have to tell you, I do not get this many lines every day in such short a time. It just happened that today was a good day.
Hope this helps.
copies of previously transcribed reports
What I always found helped, make copies of reports from the medical record charts. Make a few copies of each doctor and keep them in your desk that way you can refer back to the report when doing the doctor. You will get the hang of it. No hospital wants to go through the money and time hiring someone just to let them go right away. Usually you get about a three to six month probation period.
Guidelines are one thing, but if your client wants it transcribed a certain way, just do it.
p
I am filling out a job app and they want transcribed words per minute.
Thanks.
Pull up the whole period for which transcribed...see more inside
Say July 1 was the first day and July 14 was the last day - are you able to do a date-specific count? If so, get that on the screen, hit the "Print Screen" button (above SysRq next to Scroll Lock). Then open a Word document or go to Accessories and get either Word Pad or Notebook. Do a control C, which is the Word command for copy. This will copy the whole screen shot into that new document. Go to "file" on the task bar, do a "Save as" and name it what you want, say 07012008to07142008 or something so you will be able to recognize it. This will now give you a document that you can email to their payroll period with a nice little message something to the tune of "WHAT GIVES" or other equally professional question - just kidding, but now you have proof of what your total lines were and a bargaining tool. If you can only do it 1 day at a time, you can still use the screen shot method, but you will have a lot of documents to email if it comes to that.
Be sure to question them verbally by phone first as that might clear up any confusion. If not, then you can tell them YOUR line count and ask why your figures are so different. Just a thought. Good luck!
Meds are not given based on transcribed reports
Meds in hospitals are not given based on what is in transcribed reports. There are so many errors with transcribed material that everyone expects there to be errors in meds, either because it was dictated incorrectly or transcribed incorrectly.
Physicians write orders for drugs, treatments, tests, and procedures. They're in a different part of the record entirely. They're either handwritten or they are in electronic form.
That's not saying there are no medication administration errors, but just saying the likelihood of an error stemming from a transcribed report are almost nil.
I have Vonage and love it so far. My understanding is sm
 that as long as you cable or DSL access, you can hook up your modem anywhere and use it for your phone service. You might give them a call and verify that this is correct, though, or check out their website at www.vonage.com.
Good luck!
thanks, Cookie, your understanding reply to my
(as another poster called it) "whining" what a great Christmas present. Empathy is a great gift.
You'd think a doctor's office would be more understanding - DUH!
Ever tried to do your transcription with bilateral ear infections? Can't hear, running a fever, dizzy-can hardly sit upright, but still expected to do work that requires HEARING and sitting at a computer! And, I can't win, because as soon as I get this work done (which is taking 2x as long), there are going to be so many mistakes I am going to get ragged about that as well! 
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