Who is that in the room writing about me?

With the advent of the Electronic Medical Record, many physicians find that they just cannot keep up with the system’s need for data input.  While dictation has advocates, reading and correcting transcriptions takes valuable time, leading to the often applied phrase “dictated but not read” on many such reports.  Recently, some physicians have started using scribes, like the stenographer of old but with a computer rather than a shorthand pad, to record the physician’s words for the record.  In doing so, many potential transcription errors can be avoided, but does the presence of the scribe in the examination room impact the nature of the visit?  Here is a discussion about the topic from the Medpage Today website, looking at that question.

Friday Feedback:

Are Medical Scribes a Necessary Evil?