COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY HEALTH INFORMATICS SELECTS SPEECHSERVERS

Columbia University in New York City includes undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools, a school of continuing education, and a medical center.  Recently the university's biomedical informatics program began a pilot project to convert physician telephone queries for medical literature and other information into text using server-based speech recognition.  After discussion with the senior programmer analyst for the pilot, the informatics department purchased SpeechServers™ for Dragon and related workflow software for a back-end, server-based add-on to a medical query system.   Cost and ease of integration with other applications were primary considerations in selecting the Custom Speech USA software.  

REAL-TIME AND SERVER-BASED SPEECH RECOGNITION FOR WINDOWS VISTA

On January 30, 2007, Microsoft will be making the new Vista operating system available to the general public.  Custom Speech USA has worked to update its software to run with the new Vista operating system, and the new, improved Microsoft speech recognizer that is included FREE with the operating system.  Both real-time and server-based speech recognition are available using Custom Speech USA software.  With SpeechMax™ loaded onto a system running the Vista operating system, a doctor, lawyer, or other speaker can dictate and view the transcribed text real-time.  The speaker, or a medical editor, can correct the errors in SpeechMax™ and save the corrected text for training the speech user profile.   Alternatively, the speaker can record dictation, and send it for transcription by  SpeechServers™ using Vista speech recognition.  The speaker can correct the transcribed session file, or as with real-time speech recognition, send it for correction by an editor using SpeechMax™.  There are no separate licensing fees for additional speech users with Vista speech recognition.   Windows Vista supports speech recognition for U.S. English, U.K. English, traditional Chinese, simplified Chinese, Japanese, German, French, and Spanish.  While the new Microsoft speech recognizer had problems with background noise in an earlier demonstration, Bill Meisel, editor of a widely-read newsletter on speech technologies, noted, "Microsoft redeemed itself with an impressive demo at SpeechTek in New York in early August.  The dictation demonstrated was perfectly accurate."  B. Meisel, "Microsoft Dictation Software in Vista OS Demonstrated," Speech Strategy News (September 2006).  Everything that you need to get going with Vista real-time and server-based speech recognition is available with the software suite SpeechProfessional™ for $499.  It includes SpeechMax™, SpeechServers™, audio conversion, workflow manager (including web services and web reports), and other useful utilities for dictation, transcription, and speech recognition.  The software is also compatible with Dragon and IBM speech recognition.   A PC solution SpeechStation™ is available. 

DRAGON UPDATES FOR VISTA

Over the next several weeks and months, Nuance has indicated that it will be releasing Windows Vista compatible versions of Dragon NaturallySpeaking. These will not be a new releases but update of current versions.  For further information, go to www.nuance.com/vista.

DRAGON NATURALLYSPEAKING MEDICAL 9 SMALL PRACTICE EDITION

Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9 Medical Small Practice Edition has been released. This edition offers substantial savings of hundreds of dollars for physicians who are not practicing in a hospital-based environment. If you do not need a Radiology or Pathology language module, do not use Citrix, and do not need to "Push" the local installations from a remote server, you can purchase the Small Practice Edition at substantial savings, beginning with prices as low as $699.99 per license. Through March 21st, 2007, Dragon NaturallySpeaking Medical Small Practice Edition is available for $899.99 per license for individual licenses, $3999.95 for 5 license packs and $6999.90 for 10 licenses.  The price will increase by $100.00 on March 22, 2007.  According to reviewers, Dragon NaturallySpeaking Medical 9 is compatible with virtually every Windows based EMR, and can make report writing within an EMR less time consuming.  Plus, there is a 2 month special on Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9 Legal. Get $100.00 off and a Free PDF Converter 4 Pro. For more information, click here.

MT SALARIES FALL, SPEECH RECOGNITION EDITORS BETTER PAID

In 2004, MTs responding to the survey reported average pay of $32,847.  In 2006, the average had fallen to $25,408, based on a survey of more than 2,100 MTs.  With a limited survey response, editor salaries averaged $32,000.  Possible explanations for the decreasing MT salary may include failure to get credentialing, and increasing home-based, part-time work.  "The 2006 Salary Survey Results," Advance for Health Professionals (December 4, 2006)

TRAINING MTs TO BECOME SPEECH RECOGNITION EDITORS

"With the new year upon us, more and more health care facilities will be embarking on the implementation of new software and technology.  The transcription field has already started to implement back-end speech recognition software.  With the 'editor' role flourishing as a result of the latest transcription technology, getting into editor shape is essential."  According to Terri Kaminski, owner of Transcription Matchmaker from Bainbridge, WA,  "Health care companies invest in new back-end speech recognition software and equipment, but I'm not sure they've  figured out how to transition the labor pool."  T. Cassidy, "Getting Into Editor Shape," Advance for Health Information Professionals (January 15, 2007) 


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