How to Drastically Increase Your Medical Transcription Productivity

It is likely that you chose medical transcription as your career for two reasons: Having the luxury to work from home and to make a lot of money. The only way that medical transcription jobs are not enjoyable is when you work your fingers to the bone, and do not get paid what you had hoped. Why is this? Because medical transcription is all about how much you type. If your typing is slow and you are having hard time understanding what the dictators are saying, you’re going to miss out. To succeed in this career, you have to focus more in transcription productivity than anything else. Cranking out the reports is smooth sailing as long as you can follow these quick and easy time-saving tips to help you pick up the speed:

1. Be Confident – Did you receive medical transcription training? If so, then you shouldn’t have too much difficulty with understanding medical terms. While you are in your first two years, understanding what certain doctors are saying is going to be difficult from time to time because you are indeed, a newbie. But if you can be patient and persistent, you will discover that things get much easier down the road. The most important part of having confidence in your work is knowing that you have obtained the right skills during transcription training. In your spare time, try to sit down and type only the most difficult reports. Remember that practice makes perfect.

2. Install a Word Expander – Either you can choose to go out and purchase one, or download one from the internet. A very effective word expander program is Short Hand. These programs can really help you to increase your medical transcription productivity like nothing else. For those who want to pick up the speed, word expander programs are a definite must-have. Instead of typing out the full word or sentence, you can usually just type out the first two letters and last letter of a certain word, and the word expander program inserts the entire word. Instead of only typing 100 lines per hour, depending on your typing speed, you may be able to end up typing 150 to 300 or more lines per hour.

3. Add Important Sites To Your Favorites – Instead of having to pull up another web page by typing in the address, the more beneficial thing to do would be to have it already bookmarked so that all you have to do is click on the page.

4. Own a Comfortable Desk and Chair – There is nothing worse than having transcription jobs and being uncomfortable. Aches and pains can develop when sitting in an uncomfortable position, and if your computer monitor is up too high or too low, neck strain is going to be result. From there, you’ll experience headaches and muscle tension, which can leave you feeling fatigued. Likewise, a keyboard that is not in the right position can cause you to develop carpel tunnel. This is a very important transcription productivity tip that cannot go unnoticed because you do not have to be in pain. Be sure to purchase a supportive chair for your back because you are going to be sitting down quite a lot.

5. Focus and Practice – Transcription jobs may allow you to work from home, but no one ever said that would be easy. When it comes down to it, your reports need to be a top priority because if they’re not, we all know what happens – nothing. No attention to work means no job, which means no money. Sit down and set small, yet realistic goals for yourself. For example, take your time throughout the day, especially if you are a beginner working on the most difficult reports first. Allow one of your goals to be finishing at least 10 reports in one hour each day. As you continue to type, you’ll notice that this becomes much easier. Remember to focus on quality as well so that you can continue to grow in this wonderful career field.