Technology has played a very vital role in furthering healthcare delivery, especially radiology. While high tech devices have made imaging, diagnosis and treatment more effective, several other technological marvels have simplified operations to improve its efficiency. Dragon Medical, a speech recognition software from ICONS Infocom, is a very good example. Manish Goenka, Country Head, ICONS Infocom elaborates on the various features of this product and its advantages for radiologists, in an interaction with Lakshmipriya Nair
Kindly elaborate about your offerings for the radiology market?
Manish Goenka |
The product that we offer is Dragon Medical Indian English speech recognition software. It basically converts your spoken words to text, so that one does not have to type the lengthy reports or wait for the stenos. The radiologists can just dictate, and the software shall type the same because it has an inbuilt medical dictionary. It is three times faster than typing, moreover there are no typo errors or spelling errors. In radiology, voice-recognition systems type the report as the doctor ‘reads’ it into a microphone, eliminating the transcription step. The doctor then reviews the transcription before signing it.
Typically, a report if typed takes 30-45 minutes, the turnaround time by speech recognition averages 10-15 minutes, but many people do it in five to eight minutes flat. Using the template feature the same can be reduced further; thereby giving them more time to interact with their patients. A point to be noted is that this report is ready for print, unlike the old fashioned way of recording a dictation or dictating to a transcriptionist, after which a copy is passed to the doctor for proof reading and goes for print only once it’s checked by a doctor. This is a long and repetitive process. It also wastes a lot of stationeries and is not a green practice. Speech recognition eases doctors’ growing issue of not getting medico-stenos. Moreover it is fast, accurate yet instant, cuts dependency, saves costs and the reports can be elaborated for better patient care through medical coding.
Speech recognition is the wave of the future because patient records will undoubtedly become digital. So, all physicians, and not just radiologists, will be typing, dictating, or using some combination of these and other digital input technologies, as the electronic patient record replaces the thick multi-volume patient chart, which is sometimes difficult to locate and occasionally challenging to decipher.
What are the challenges in serving the radiology market vis-a-vis other verticals?
There are not as many challenges now, as we had to face when we had originally launched the Indian English edition of Dragon Medical for the Indian market. The Indian English edition Dragon Medical has now established itself. Radiologists know it for what it’s worth and we have a close to thousand satisfied users in India. However, in the earlier days, the challenge was to tackle users’ initial apprehension about speech recognition. Convincing them to even consider a demonstration was hard but once that was done most of them were convinced with the efficacy of the product.
How has technology like what is offered by you served to enhance radiology?
Dragon Medical offers 99 per cent accuracy with minimum training time. It not only reduces the turnaround time to generate an accurate report as it is much faster but being very easy to use, it enhances productivity as well. It works with most hospital information systems (HIS), picture archiving and communication systems (PACS), radiology information systems (RIS) and electronic medical records (EMRs) and requires no integration, making it a very cost effective tool. It is user friendly and can reduce and eventually almost eliminate all reporting backlogs. It’s the next-gen reporting tool, already used widely in the West and fast catching up here. Radiologists and clinicians are able to provide detailed clinical notes than typing or EMR point-and-click templates alone, without the costs or delays associated with manual transcription. By enabling clinicians to rapidly and completely document patient encounters via their voice, Dragon Medical reduces transcription costs, improves clinician productivity, enhances patient care and increases insurer reimbursement. Dragon Medical 11 now calibrates to regional accents through an initial voice screening process. The software adapts to Indian accents. It has therefore managed to get a grip on the Indian market by fighting against all odds.
Tell us about some of your installations in healthcare set ups?
Our user base is very diverse. Dragon Medical 11 supports more than 80 medical disciplines, from family medicine and internal medicine to orthopaedics and cardiology with proprietary medical speech recognition vocabularies.
So, clearly besides radiology the software is also being used other departments like pathology, histopathology, ophthalmology, haematology, neurology, and oncology.etc in mid-size hospitals and diagnostic centres. It can also be used for preparing discharge summaries. With these specialised vocabularies available we have a track record of very satisfied and happy users. Our clients vary from large hospital chains, medical institutes and mid-size healthcare set ups to small and individual diagnostic centres.
Tell us about your new projects and your plans for this sphere?
There are a few big projects which we are working on. They are for much larger hospitals with wide implementation across various departments, though they are still in the very early stages. More details on the same cannot be disclosed at this point in time since we have signed non-disclosure agreements (NDA).
Where do you see the radiology market in India going and how do you plan to tap from its growth?
Healthcare is a growing industry and the graph is only getting better. The demand for speech recognition software is also going growing in the healthcare domain. Doctors have used dictation for years as they compile patient care history, post-care summaries, orders and prescriptions. However, not surprisingly, the short supply of human resources in this field has caused the doctors to make a shift from traditional means to a recording device and pay transcribers to put it on paper. We have simplified matters with our Dragon Medical speech recognition software that enables the doctor to dictate directly into any Windows-based applications like his PACS/RIS/EMR while he views the report, thereby eliminating the need for a steno or a transcriptionist yet delivering quicker, faster and accurate reports for critical patient care. As I said, it is the future in the reporting system. It’s a global shift.