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With the growing demand for high quality and HIPAA compliant transcription work, more and more healthcare organizations and physicians are turning towards outsourced transcription services to maintain their reports and documents.

Most in-house administrative assistants and secretaries cannot transcribe dictations as accurately as a certified transcriptionist, and you may be compromising quality and compliance as a result. Since you may also be responsible for training costs and certification for these individuals, the expense involved may overextend your budget.

Outsourcing transcription services presents one option for your healthcare organization and provides a number of benefits such as:

1.Faster turnaround times. If you request a secretary or administrative assistant to complete the transcription work, they may not be able to dedicate enough time towards each project. Most administrative assistants and secretaries must juggle multiple projects at one time, and rarely have enough time available to focus exclusively on transcription work. This can compromise the quality of the reports and work they produce, and can make it much more difficult to keep up a steady workflow.

2.Accurate transcriptions of dictation. Accuracy is one of the most important factors involved with transcription reports, and professional transcriptionists are trained and certified to ensure accurate reporting at all times. Accuracy can be achieved by checking and double checking the work, but few in-house assistants and secretaries will have the time available to complete each step of the process. A certified medical transcriptionist that works with an outsourced transcription service provider may be able to complete all reporting with a higher level of accuracy and efficiency.

3.HIPAA compliance and legal reporting processes. Certified medical transcriptionists are required to adhere to all HIPAA laws and regulations, and a reliable outsourced transcription company will ensure all work submitted complies with HIPAA rules. This ensures that all client data and reporting is secure and safe, and does not compromise patient security. Making sure all of the personal data you are working with remains safe can be challenging when you hand off the project to a secretary or assistant.

4.Document security and easy access. This is a part of HIPAA compliance, and ensures that all data is stored in a secure, data-encrypted interface. This means most physicians and healthcare organization managers will be provided with a login name and password to access the data. This is a security measure that may be overlooked if the transcription services are completed in-house

5.Backup of all documentation and data. Many transcription companies offer backup services as part of the contract fee or project rate, and this can help you maintain solid records for the long-term. In-house office managers may not have the resources or skills to keep track of this data with utmost accuracy, so it may be easier to work with a reliable outsourced transcription company to manage this task.

Other benefits of working with an outsourced transcription company are: a reduced risk of errors; consistency and adherence to workflow expectations; limited delays in work submitted; consistent reporting; and reduced costs overall. Shifting towards outsourcing for medical transcription services is quickly becoming the preferred choice of many healthcare professionals and organizations.