Isn’t this always a burning question? Depending on how long you have been involved in the medical field, perhaps, but the longer you are in it, the quicker your response comes back: Yes, it IS crucial! The problem today is that so many of our medical records are being transcribed in so many different countries, none of which have the rules and regulations we have here in the United States relating to confidentiality of personal medical information.
In the 1990s, I had the questionable privilege of teaching at a Vocational Technical School, teaching medical transcription to juniors and seniors in high school. It was challenging, since it was obvious that senioritis was and is a definite, and sometimes debilitating, condition (and should be categorized as such). Unfortunately, there is no remedy for it but graduation!
Like many idealistic new teachers, I went into the project thinking it would be wonderful to teach these young people and delighted in fantasies of them eagerly accepting my pearls of wisdom, yada, yada, yada. The reality was like a bucket of cold water to the face! My class that year consisted only of female students. Do you remember high school? Do you remember how impossible female junior/senior girls can be? Were you one of them?
Be that as it may, the realization that transcription was beyond their years came with the class on Confidentiality when one of the young women, a junior, looked at me pityingly (and superciliously, I might add). As she glared down her nose at me, she sniped, “Well! (huff in voice and a fluff in her chair) EVERYONE tells secrets!” Stunned, I stood there, rather stupidly I admit, and thought; “Oh! This can’t be real. Someone please get me out of here!” That very afternoon found me in the director’s office rearranging the curriculum and turning the class into a (remedial) Basic Medical Office/receptionist class. And I was out of there! The thought of teaching those boringly basic skills to people who just didn’t care was too much for me to handle.
Alternatively, there were the adult students who delighted me with their variety of presentations on Anatomy. One woman dressed our Bucky Bones (skeleton) in a dress, high-heeled shoes and a beautiful scarf, then proceeded to tell us what muscles this Senorita would use when she went dancing. Would it surprise you to learn she received an A for that class?
I sometimes wonder where those students are today. There is only one with whom I have any contact and she has developed into a lovely wife and mother, and yes, she does transcription – for her local police department! And confidentiality is just as much a prime consideration today as it has been for many years.
It still bothers me that our transcription industry is being outsourced to other countries, mostly because of “the bottom line” so I smile when one of my medical practitioners uses their own computer, even if most of it is templates. At least I know it is local and not going out of the country.
