ACE10 Overview

Last week, PRN Funding exhibited at AHDI’s 2010 Conference and Expo at the Hilton Austin in Austin, Texas. Overall, this medical transcription trade show was a good one.

Thanks to the Around the World Contest, PRN Funding’s team of medical transcription invoice funding specialists were able to meet a lot of the show’s attendees. Medical Transcription Service Owners (MTSOs) were especially intrigued by PRN Funding’s factoring services.

PRN Funding looks forward to exhibiting at ACE11 in Phoenix, AZ next year!

NY Times Reviews Nuance’s NaturallySpeaking 11

Last week, Nuance released NaturallySpeaking 11, and David Pogue of the New York Times had a few things to say about the upgrade. Pogue referred to Nuance as a “near-monopoly in the speech-recognition game” that continues to make “steady improvements and price cuts.”

PRN Funding’s medial transcription invoice factoring specialists summarized the review below:

15% more accurate.

4-minute training (used to be 15 minutes).

Cheat sheet of commands that fills panel on right-hand side of computer screen.

Additional speak-to-type commands – Ability to open programs, pick menu commands, click Web links, move the cursor, format text, etc.

Apply the same formatting to every occurrence of a word/phrase in a document.

The software can recognize children’s voices now.

Accuracy improves regardless of how you manually edit corrections (type over or speak the correction).

Click here to read the entire review of Nuance’s NaturallySpeaking 11.

Medical Transcription Funders at ACE10

Austin, TX-PRN Funding is exhibiting at the Association for Healthcare Documentation Integrity’s (AHDI) Annual Convention and Expo at the Hilton Austin August 4-7, 2010.

Owner of PRN Funding, Phil Cohen, and Account Manager, Ryan Elliott, will be available in booth 511 to speak to attendees about PRN Funding’s medical transcription accounts receivable factoring program.

MTSOs and medical transcriptionists are encouraged to stop by PRN Funding’s booth to get a sticker as part of the Wheel of Prizes game. After visiting with participating exhibitors and collecting stickers, attendees can turn in their completed cards for a chance to spin the Wheel of Prizes. In addition, convention attendees will judge exhibitors and their booths during the exhibit hall based on two categories: Most Friendly Booth Staff and Most Creative Booth.

With years of experience in the medical transcription industry, PRN Funding has a precise understanding of the unique challenges within medical transcription. PRN Funding offers financial resources to these companies by purchasing their accounts receivable–a process known as ‘factoring,’ which provides the cash needed to sustain and grow a healthcare business.

Calling MTIA Members – Host Congressional Visits

According to MTIA’s blog, the medical transcription organization is “encouraging its members’ companies to continue efforts initiated during the Advocacy Summit in strengthening and building relationships with members of Congress in local and regional locations over the summer. These meetings, or constituent coffees, provide a rare opportunity to interact directly with elected officials about the industry as well as discuss the important role MTs and MTSOs play in the healthcare community. Meetings can be held in company offices or in client locations to share the work we do in contributing to patient care delivery.

The Dewey Square Group has created Guidelines for Hosting a Regional Congressional Meeting to assist you with scheduling a local visit with your members of Congress.

If you have any further questions or would like assistance in getting started, please contact Andrew Wolf at awolf@ahdionline.org or Miranda Youkhaneh at myoukhaneh@ahdionline.org.”

Healthcare Reform – 1099 Nightmare for Small Businesses

Last week, BusinessWeek published an article entitled: Health-Care Bill Surprise: 1099 Nightmare, and we thought the small business owners who read The Factoring Blog should be aware of its contents.

In essence, the article says: Small business owners should be aware of page 737 of the recently-approved healthcare reform bill, as it contains a three-paragraph provision, inserted by Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee to help offset the cost of the bill. In a nutshell, this insertion requires companies to report to the IRS payments of more than $600 a year to any vendor. The intent is noble: to capture $2 billion or more a year in taxes on income that currently goes unreported by contractors and small businesses.

Business advocates fear that the new rule will create a massive paperwork headache for small businesses because come 2012, the new rule will expand 1099-MISC reporting to include payments to companies, and for goods as well as services.

Read more here: Health-Care Bill Surprise: 1099 Nightmare.

MTSOs Gain New Compliance Program

Review of Systems-expanded (ROSe) recently announced that it has added an advanced-level program to its compliance training offering specifically designed for medical transcription service organizations (MTSOs).

Developed by lead ROSe instructor, Brenda J. Hurley, CMT, ADHI-FL, the Advanced Compliance Course Training consists of four classes surround topics such as security risk assessments, policy development for reducing potential risks, and tips for business associate agreements.

According to For the Record Magazine, the new course “offers MTSOs the ability to provide instruction to their medical transcription staff regarding the new compliance requirements and new security and privacy risks they will encounter in their daily work activities.

There is special pricing available through June 30th. For more info, visit www.rosemtschool.com.

2010 National Medical Transcription Week

It’s hard to believe that 25 years have gone by since President Ronald Reagan signed a proclamation making this week National Medical Transcription Week.

Here are some fun medical transcription facts to keep in mind while celebrating the week:

  • There are 1.2 billion medical records produced in the U.S. every year.
  • 60% of those records are documented via medical transcription/dictation.
  • Dictation/medical transcription is still the preferred method among US physicians for documenting patient encounters.

For more information on the 2010 Medical Transcription Week, please visit AHDI’s web site.

Review of 2010 MTIA Conference

Although we weren’t necessarily thrilled when MTIA decided to raise it’s membership fees, the medical transcription factoring specialists at PRN Funding continued to support the organization.

Part of our allegiance is to exhibit at the 21st Annual MTIA Conference in Daytona Beach. Although it was great for networking, and the show was structured very well, we were disappointed with the attendee turnout. The 2010 numbers were significantly lower than past years.

Q: If you routinely attend the medical transcription trade show, why did you choose to go (or not go) to the 2010 MTIA Conference?

Transcription Battle over Spheris

In February, the nation’s second largest medical transcription provider, Spheris, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and filed documents  stating that it would sell its American and Canadian assets to MedQuist, Inc. If the sale were to go through, MedQuist would become the America’s largest medical transcription provider.

Since the announcement of the Spheris-MedQuist deal, there have been several complaints:

  • Nuance objected the deal because it would give MedQuist an unfair advantage over other potential bidders.
  • MutilModal Technologies, Inc., who provides SRT to Spheris, filed a complaint saying the sale would put the company’s intellectual property at risk because MedQuist is a competitor.
  • Oracle objected the deal because the sale would allow an unauthorized transfer of Oracle’s software that’s used in Spheris’ applications.

A bankruptcy judge was scheduled to hold an auction of Spheris’ assets on April 13.

Click here to read the entire article: Spheris auction set to shake up medical transcription industry.

More Docs Adopting Health Information Technology

For years, physicians have been resisting advanced technologies, but according to an article in For The Record magazine, times are a changing.

In the past, physicians have been reluctant to adopt new technologies is because it would mean doctors would have to devote more time towards patient documentation. Other reasons why physicians were not interested in adapting is because of the costs involved with adding infrastructure, training and learning new technologies and realigning the workflow process.

However, the onset of user-friendly mHealth (mobile health) applications coupled with recent medical school graduates entering the profession with mounds of technology experience from the classroom is changing the scene.

In addition, as speech recognition technology continues to improve, more physicians are sure to adopt it into their everyday lifestyle. Moreover, there is a movement toward more mobile offerings designed for physician interface and documentation are the trend among SRT vendors. In short, the iPhone is a popular gadget for doctors, so SRT vendors are trying to make their technology incorporate smoothly with the iPhone technology.

Ruthann Russo, PhD, JD, MPH, RHIT, a documentation specialist who was interviewed for the article said, “There is a clear need for an integrated IT platform that will do the following:

  • improve quality, safety, efficiency, and reduce health disparities;
  • engage patients and families
  • improve care coordination
  • improve population and public health; and
  • ensure adequate privacy security protections for PHRs(patient health records)”

Click here to read the entire article: Physician Documentation: Slow No More

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