OP notes are a challenge - just depends if you are determined enough
Posted By: Indy-MT on 2007-05-25
In Reply to: They are dictation describing operations? Are you sure - you are ready for a switch? nm
to learn how to do them. After doing DS, HP, CR and Clinic Notes, I was asked by former National to try to do about 20 OP reports. I was terrified !! Thought I had a good grasp of anatomy, physiolgy, etc, but I'll swear I ended up looking up every instrument, suture, needle, forceps, retractor, etc., & hate to guess how many hours I spent doing those 20 reports (that was before internet resources & my salary was dependent on how much work I did !!). Going from Clinic Notes, etc., to OP reports is not an easy transition - there is a vast difference. I did struggle in the beginning & know it took me a good 6 months before I became comfortable transcribing them. For me, it has ended up being for my benefit. That National, from that time on, only assigned me OP reports. Having since left original National & having searched for a job with different companies stating that I specialized in OP reports, I received unexpected offers at a higher than average cpl pay !
Don't be disillusioned thinking that you can apply for a job doing OP reports after doing Clinic Notes if you have no experience doing such. If you don't have an opportunity to try to learn them in your present job & you're interested in learning such, you might consider getting the SUM practice tapes that have original OP dictation. Just depends on how much you want to learn their terminology & how much effort you're willing to put forth :o) :o).
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Some have said clinic, some op notes, some ER, depends on what you
s
Depends on clinic notes, sm
I really think it depends on the type of clinic notes you transribed. I went from transcribing very detailed and lengthy multispecialtiy outpatient clinic notes for a major teaching hospital to transcribing acute care, mainly op notes, for another hospital, and it seemed to make the transition, although I felt very confident after about 3 months. But if you were transcribing clinic notes for just a regular outpatient clinic or clinics (well child checkups, lots of cold and flu, etc) you may have a longer transition period. It really just depends on whether it's a teaching hospital, the number of dictators, etc? You CAN do it though--it is all a matter of mindset. If it IS a teaching hospital or they have an ophthalmology department, I would definitely recommend getting the Stedman's Ophthalmology book. That made my transition SO much easier, that book, and the Stedman's Equipment Words. Good luck. Just give yourself 3-6 months to get acclimated to the op notes, number of doctors/residents, etc., don't pressure yourself to get it right away, and make copies of each report for every dictator--it will save you in the long run because they usually say the same things. Good Luck!!
Generally 200 lph, but depends on work type, I can do more with OP notes, has to do with motivation
I hate HP, consults, and DS, but that is the majority of what I do. I always, always do better with OP notes.
And you'll almost never get just Op notes. Probably get mixed acute care - op notes, discharge su
s
It is very frustrating when your pay is determined
by your output and you can't produce with the dictators. It does get easier and I can do them fairly well know, but I do some really, really bad ones - heavy accents, mumblers, can't pronounce words, etc. and even though I can get through them without any blanks it is VERY frustrating, especially when you have several of them at a time.
Some of the dictators I have now I can fly through, but the first time I had them I was ready to quit because I left lots of blanks and I just don't leave blanks. I can't believe I ever thought they were hard because they are so easy now. You have to train your ears. Give yourself a couple of weeks and if it doesn't get better ask for another account or start looking. Every company is going to have some bad dictators, ESL or otherwise, but doing 10% and doing 90% is a big difference.
Good luck - hope it gets better.
Well, after all this, I've determined something must be
wrong with the file itself that it won't play. You see, I currently work in Emdat Inscribe and I get sound just fine with that and I've taken three other MT tests recently via the net and the sound has worked fine, too. I do not use a foot pedal and am quite comfortable using hot keys. Oh, well, I've spent too much time on this to no avail. Thanks everyone for your help. You're the best.
that's determined by your bills!!...
There is an easier calculation but I think most companies require 1200 lines a day nowadays. Some 800 to maintain fulltime. One way to figure it is that you take the amount of lines x cpl and divide by 8. If you typed your other stuff in word, check the line count to see what you have done on a good day when paid by the hour. Hopefully you are getting paid characters and spaces as opposed to just characters.
If you figure you can put out only 800, which is still a good bit, 800 x 0.08 cpl divided by 8 would be $8/hour. 1200 lines would be 12 an hour. So, if you are currently making 10 an hour, you would have to put out 1000 lines a day for $10 an hour.
It can be done.
letter explaining that since they have determined
we are 20% more productive with ASR we deserve a 20% pay cut. Do you suppose they are giving the client a 20% break? Yes, it IS the entire company, anyone that does Automated Speech Recognition.
Able to view line count, see how it is being determined.--sm
also completely word based, with all the Word functions being operable, such as compatible margins, abilithank you to use tab functions, etc. Able to view previous reports. Not SLOW, which to me, is huge. that is all I can think of, for now. I am sure there is more.
You can do it but you have to be determined, have a solid office background helps, obviously an - sm
interest in the field helps too. You don't get a lot of sleep when you are trying to work with kids at home. I started this 3 years ago when my kids were 2 and 3, I basically only worked when they napped and at night after they went to bed. I only worked part-time too, but for the 1st 10 months I had 3 PT jobs, so I was basically FT and obviously very tired. But I was trying to get as much experience and exposure as possible. It has paid off for me. I generally work 2 jobs at once as I don't like having all my eggs in one basket (I need a min. monthly income of $1K) though right now I am only doing one PT, about 3000-4000 lines every 2 weeks. I am back to working nights and early morning now though at the current time. But a strong office background helps a lot, discipline, and determination. My strong office and lab background helped a lot for me to make the transition to working at home and also I was used to working unsupervised. You tend to get thrown to the wolves doing this so you better be able to land on your feet quick. CareerStep is supposed to be a very good school though, I know a few people who did it and were hired straight away, granted that was 3 years ago and the work is a lot harder now at least with the nationals. I prefer the small MTSO, generally a better grade of work and people. Good Luck. 
The program is being determined by the file extension you're receiving. sm
If you're receiving a voice file that's opening automatically in MediaPlayer (which is what I think you're trying to say), then you will need to change the program that is automatically associated with that file type so that it will open the program you want to use.
The easiest way to do this is to open Explorer, locate the voice file, right mouse click on it and choose Properties. On the General tab in the first "block" where is says Opens With, click the Change button and then choose the program you want to use from the list that appears. This will change the program that opens ALL files with that extension.
To change
if you determined you do have a sound card, uninstall express scribe and reinstall. sm
i have had some computer issues recently and it seemed there were some quirks with downloading it. i had to reinstall to get mine functioning although i wasn't getting the exact same response as you, but issues. i would also update your drivers if you do have a sound card before buying another one. right click my computer icon, hit properties, hardware tab, device manager, look under sound, video, and game controllers and you will see a sound card there if you have one. also notice if there are any yellow triangles or anything as those signal a conflict. email me if you need to.
If you are up to the challenge
with SS
OH. Now you want more challenge...
But you also state it was a small account. Why do they only assign you to ONE account? Cross training for others is out? Is it a small account and "NOT ENOUGH WORK" as you initially stated, or now it's because you can "DO IT IN (YOUR) SLEEP".
LOL
Now, that is a challenge
it seems that going into the petites section gets you into the clothes that are made for the younger kids. I totally feel your pain. If anyone out there has any suggestions that would be great. Like you, I'm short and small-boned. Finding age-appropriate clothes is a real toughy! :-)
It was the challenge
Used to be, I felt like I was playing some sort of computer game, trying every day to "win" by increasing my line count, overcoming the ESL's and unintelligible speedtalkers. But when the greedy companies and corporations took over, they started stacking the odds against us, the game was fixed and it wasn't fun anymore. Set yourself some new goals, financial or imagination-stretching. Remember, you have a life, and this is not it, just the means.
A challenge to all MT's....sm
I feel that we've said it all - the rest is just blah, blah, blah! Yeah, we need a place to vent but how about we challenge ourselves - each and every one of us try to find someone in the public eye to whom we should all individually write! If someone, say, at 20/20, 60 minutes, etc. were to get hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of well-written and well edited letters enunciating each and every point; from why all off-shore transcription should be illegal (it is against HIPAA), to how little we (the transcriptionist) is really getting paid, to how much each IC or at-home employee actually saves the physician or hospital or clinic, etc. than we will have some attention put on the industry. Another big point to investigate is just how much these national (and international) companies pay their chief operating officers, etc. What used to be a viable career has become nearly impossible to continue. If anyone thinks that a national effort to attact the necessary attention to our problem is a good idea, respond here and let's see if we can get a letter written that we can all forward to our state senators as well as to the media. A MEDIA BLITZ will either make us or brake us - we'll either get what we deserve or we'll all lose to off-shore transcriptionists (which we're doing anyway)! A one day work strike nationally would work well too and would get a lot of media attention! Particularly on a Wednesday (middle of the week) but all need to agree to lose one day's pay...but don't worry, the companies will be desperate and put us all to work on the weekend to catch up (at our regular rate, of course)! What do YOU think?
You like to challenge?
Ridiculous ego.
Challenge yourself - sm
One of the four doctors I do has an accent - Indian - and the others "speak English". I would much rather do the accent than put up with the sloppy, slurry, lazy way the others dictate. I have found that once you do an "accent" the next one is easier. Don't be intimated - give it a try - challenge yourself - it's part of life.
A challenge...
Okay folks... I like everybody else have seen my pay go down lately and have been complaining about having to work more to get the work done; I also see people talking about how many hours a day they have to work to get their lines for the day and how it equals minimum wage, etc.
Well, I went to the store and bought a cheap timer. I set it every hour for 55 minutes and I would take a 5 minute break at the end of that 55 minutes. I did not move my butt from the chair during that first 55 minutes - just typed. No phone calls, no surfing the web, no answering people's yells, no TV, no laundry, no dishes, NOTHING, NADA, just typing. Here are my results -
165 minutes (2 hours and 45 minutes) and I got 1129 lines. That averages out to be 410 lines an hour. For my pay, that is $41 an hour.
My challenge is to each of you who say you are not getting your work done to try this yourself and post your results and let's see what happens...
Should we all take an MT challenge?
We all realize that our situations are different and within our own accounts can be so very different on different days. (Oh, how I hate those days when I would swear my line count will be great and it turns out to be lower than the day before when I felt I didn't work nearly as hard!)
But what we can do to see how much time we are wasting is to do the same challenge for a week straight. We will likely have a variety of work to deal with and can see how much different our line counts end up.
I have noticed I tend to get up from my chair more, out of stress and frustration, when I am having a tough dicatator or subject matter. I tend to want to check my email after sending a job because there are several seconds before I can open the next dictation. I probably lose some time there (beyond the pause time).
It would be interesting to see how much different things turn out for us all. Not the acutal line counts (since situations are so much different), but the increases we end up with.
Anyone want to try this for a week and see how we end up next weekend?
I agree. I would see it as a challenge. I took a
college class where they posted everyone's ID# and then grades for each test/assignment, etc. You could see where you stood. It was a self-paced course and seeing that a couple of people had already whizzed through and were almost done, and with HIGH scores, made me want to pick up the pace and make sure MY scores were presentable. I didn't want anyone looking at my anonymous scores and saying "What is that person's problem?" I ended up not at the top but near the top. Some people just didn't even turn in assignments at all and had big fat 0s and poor scores on the test and I was thinking "Uh, what was the point in paying for this class if you're not going to try to get a decent grade?" 
I took your challenge today
and I buckled down as well and I got in 1 hour and 28 minutes 824 lines!!!! Yes, it was an easy doctor, but that is all the work I have today is from him. That gives me $43.95/hr. Wish I could have him all day. I'll try to average out the day if I get anyone else in.
Okay, I took your challenge, Amanda. SM
ME: Below-average typing talent. Sad but true. I'm a clutz. Use an expander, though.
I'm paid good but not top-level industry rates.
I work 35 hours per week, not 40.
So-so account, lots of ESL, mixed transcription and editing.
CHALLENGE: Worked in my usual manner for two hours of average work flow, i.e., not fast or slow. One coffee-refill break.
RESULTS: 291 lines per hour X my pay plus incentive = $32/hour = $56K/year for a 35/hour week.
IF I worked 40 hrs/wk, that would be $64K, but I prefer not to. Like you, I do prefer to work fairly intensively while I am working as a tradeoff to a shorter workday.
Good post, Amanda! Back to work now.
Amanda's Challenge
Until two days ago, I had several accounts. One of those accounts I used to smile and call "butta." (As in butter). I've been an MT for close to 30 yrs, Amanda, and this account that was taken away from me had tons of challenging ORs, not colonoscopies, etc. I made great line count--now I have an account that is populated by physicians who don't organize their thoughts before they start dictating, open their mouths and spew absolute nonsense (and the patient's safety is OUR responsibility-HAH). One doc in particular says each sentence at least three times and changes each version subtly (on a verbatim account, yet), leaves sentences dangling, hops all over the place and in general is a pain in the butt. You know, Amanda, I challenge myself every working day and with this latest smack in the head by my employer, I'm thinking of asking my doctor for antidepressants. You're a Republican, Amanda, and you have to act like this general mistreatment of MTs over the last five or so years is our own fault. Sorry, honey, the Obama sign stays on my front lawn.
What do politics have to do with this challenge?
I feel bad that you lost your account, but you don't need to be taking your anger out on other people and start calling them Republicans and blaming her for your belief of the mistreatment of MTs. This was a simple challenge on how to make more money and spend your time wisely.
Definitely challenge it - I've heard of others who have
asked for a review and they were then found to have passed. Go for it.
take Amanda's challenge. it's down a lot of posts with a fire tag.NM
no message.
I'd gladly take the challenge if there was any freaking WORK to do..!
x
I will challenge the law. I am paid by piece work and that is excluded.
sheesh
I challenge you all to host a Halloween/Fall party at your house this year! sm
 You will have an eyeball! I mean, ball.
This will be my 1st, usually my sister-in-law does it. I picked up A Taste of Home's Halloween issue and if that doesn't inspire you to do something this fall, then you might be dead...pun intended.
For dessert I am going to make little witches that will make a neat centerpiece. Here's how you do it: Take 16 large marshmallows, oreo cookies, coconut slivers (for the hair that you dye green with food coloring), Hershey kisses and peanut butter cups (miniature) that will be the top of her hat (place candies on top of oreo chocolate cookie (minus one side of cookie and the frosting). Use pretzels for her broomstick. These things are so cute I can hardly stand it.
2. Spider cupcakes. Use chocolate EVERYTHING and for the legs use 8 small pieces of licorice dangling from the cupcake and anything small and red for the eys (M&M minis) or red icing.
There are tons of ideas and recipes. The main dish will be Witch's Brew Stew and it looks awesome! If you want the recipe, email me. If not, then drop dead.
Oh, and for the kiddies, I will be playing games like pin the stem on the pumpkin and bobbing for body parts (will probably call this game something else), but you fill up a large tin bucket, stain the water black and put things in inside. Each kid takes turns using their hands to try to find 3 things you tell them to find in this nasty mixture of stuff using their HANDS, not mouth.....
So, get your invitations out, dust off your printers and have fun! I'm doing this mid-month, not on Halloween since I am a Christian and we don't celebrate Halloween.
LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL
ER notes
Don't worry. It has been my experience being a Transcriptionist for a huge hospital that I loved the ER notes the most. They are really pretty much abbreviated H&P's and are sometimes the most interesting reports of all. Not nearly as difficult as some surgeries or discharges notes can be. Simple and brief and sometimes a really good story.
OP NOTES
I just started doing op notes at the hospital I work in and it is hard as there are so many different instruments they use that I have never even heard of. I use a surgical word book and Google a lot. That's about it.
To me, O.R. notes
 get really boring. I prefer discharges - just my personal opinion. Plus once I get used to them, I can go really fast.
Doc notes
I do two internal medicine Docs, SOAP notes only and minor procedures and love it I also did other specialities, but all that was lost to outsourcing to INDIA!
op notes
Operative notes. Perhaps as far a leap from clinic work as is possible. Not something for you to jump into with no experience.
Not op notes but
This site has brand names of surgical instruments. You can choose by speciality and manufacturer also.
http://ptiresource.50megs.com/about.html
Even for op notes? sm
I can see where being paid this way would have its advantages when doing DS and work types where there is a lot of paper shuffling, looking for values, etc., but I am concerned about op notes where the dictation is speedier.
OP notes
I love doing OP notes. They are so interesting. Anyway there is a website that I use now and then and it is
www.mt911.com it also has samples.com on it and has alot of different samples.
Also a good reference book is The surgical word book by Saunders.
Hope this helps.
OP notes
I only type OPs. I have done it for 8+years and LOVE IT. Its a niche that is hard for companies to fill, it seems. I would say it would be a great move on your part. Good luck!
Op notes
At my current company, op notes are paid at 9 cents a line for over a year experience. At my previous company, op notes were paid the same as any other type of report; cpl was based on difficulty of the account and ranged from 7.5 to 10 cpl, with op notes being paid the same as other basic 4 reports.
OP notes
If you already work for a service, maybe they have OP accounts. I would tell them you would like to learn. Ask if they could assign you a few each day and have them go to QA for feedback.
I would also buy a few surgical reference books. I feel the books are much easier to use than Google because so many instruments, brand names, etc, sound alike.
Good luck. I love my OP accounts.
RE: OP notes
Some people like OPs and some people like DS. I like DS. They talk too fast on OPs. If you can get them down, they say about the same thing. You can put that in your shortcuts and make more money just by popping it in there.
OP notes
Any good sites for OP notes?
thanks Lori
Op notes
Does anybody have any tips on the best places to specialize in op notes? I need a place where I can do heavy volume ops -- not interested in basic 4 stuff.
Thanks.
me too as far as the notes and sm
standard phrases for certain docs go. It was nice when the docs would come in and talk too or even fuss sometimes! haha Most MTs knew how to come back at them and didn't take a whole lot off them and didn't have to. They respected us (at least most of them) for that. I think there are actually docs now that don't even realize there is a "person" behind all of this doing MT. NEver thought I would see this profession get like this taht's for sure.
And probably her notes look like
Op notes do fit in expander (nm)
x
So if you've never done OP notes,
do they figure 3 out of 4 ain't bad????? 
Would like to exchange notes..sm
I'm thinking along these same lines..email me. I have some questions.
Love OP notes, which I could do them always. nm
xxxx
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