Emdat Inc., a leading provider of clinical documentation software designed to bridge the gap between Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems and traditional dictation, announced today a record quarter for new contract signings. The quarter’s new partnerships include Nelson Systems, a national reseller of technical services and support, as well as multiple medical facilities and regional and government-based medical transcription service providers throughout the United States.

Nelson Systems, Inc. specializes in technical services that support mission critical voice and data applications, including hospitals, law offices, call centers and emergency settings. Nelson Systems will be reselling a host of Emdat applications, including the mobile app Emdat Mobile, which maximize clinician efficiency, increase documentation accuracy and help their healthcare clients provide the best care possible.

Emdat Mobile...

Emdat is pleased to announce the release of Emdat Mobile for Android. The Emdat Mobile application is already very popular on the iPhone, and we are excited to be able to deliver the same easy-to-use application for Android powered devices. The Android app allows physicians to view their patient schedule, dictate, review, and approve transcription. In addition, we’ve introduced a few new features to this version. Android users will be able to see their schedules in different views, review transcription in any part of the workflow, and dictate with Insert, Overwrite and Append options. Emdat is dedicated to the continued development of our Mobile applications — we look forward to bringing these features and more to both platforms in the near future.

You can download and install Emdat Mobile for Android from the Android Market.

You can...

Emdat will be hosting it's fourth User Group Conference December 12-14, 2011 in Scottsdale, AZ at the Four Seasons Resort Scottsdale at Troon North.

Register now for this great opportunity to learn and network with peers and Emdat leaders. Session topics include Emdat’s latest advances in mobile applications, EMR integration, voice understanding and meaningful use, in addition to industry trends, new technologies, effective marketing techniques and HIPAA. Early registration rates apply before September 15, 2011. For more information, visit our 2011 User Conference page.

Medical Health Imaging and Healthcare IT News recently published stories on Emdat Mobile for iPhone, iPad and Windows Mobile. Highlighting updates to the software, the publications detail improvements in usability and security.

The 2011 Emdat User Conference will be held December 12-14, 2011 at the Four Seasons Resort Scottsdale at Troon North Scottsdale, AZ

Emdat clients are invited to join us as we summit in the sun to discuss industry trends and new technologies.  Enjoy compelling presentations and question-and-answer sessions while networking with peers and Emdat leaders.  Learn about Emdat's latest advances in mobile apps, EMR integration, voice recognition and qualified text.  Discover how to maximize your use of the suite of applications and employ effective marketing techniques.

We have secured the amazing room rate of $163 per night plus tax. Rooms include magnificent desert views and gas-burning fireplaces.  This breathtaking property offers a luxurious spa, access to renowned courses at Troon North Golf Club, and exquisite dining.   

More information on this rewarding event will be available in the next few months. 

Make the most of Emdat's applications! Join us in Madison, WI for a three day training class June 8th-10th. You'll learn the basics as well as the advanced features of InCommand, InQuiry, InSync, InScribe, and ShadowPrint. Visit the Emdat Training Class category at www.emdathelp.com to sign up!

New features of the latest edition of Emdat Mobile:

Bob Haugen, Chuck Strain and Randy Olver are heading to the Clinical Documentation Industry Association (CDIA) 2011 Annual Conference in Charlotte, NC, April 13-16, 2011. Visit Emdat at booth 207 to learn how Emdat can facilitate EMR adoption by allowing physicians to enjoy all the benefits of an EMR while continuing to dictate.

PracticeLink.com recently spoke to several physicians employing Emdat's integration with EMRs for the article Transcription gone high tech. Because Emdat allows them to continue to dictate while still enjoying the benefits of EMRs, they're saving time and providing better patient care.

Like many healthcare organizations in recent years, Northwestern Medical Faculty Foundation and Loyola University Health System have adopted electronic medical records (EMRs) as a way to streamline their documentation process. However, converting to EMRs without disrupting physician workflow presented a unique challenge, given that many doctors prefer dictating patient notes orally as opposed to entering information manually into a computer. For both health systems, the solution came in the form of EMR integration from Emdat Inc. Read all about it.

On Tuesday, March 8th, Emdat will be releasing the first in a series of updates to our InQuiry and InCommand web applications. With Tuesday's release, the following changes will be in affect:

A recent HISTALK blog post included the following reader-submitted article about the value of transcription in modern healthcare documentation.

Emdat is pleased to announce the release of our newest case study, featuring Valley Transcription. Since partnering with Emdat in 2009, Valley Transcription has enjoyed an increase in business revenue, client satisfaction and MT productivity. Amongst the many benefits of the Emdat suite of applications, Valley Transcription owner Sally Kennel cited physician satisfaction with Emdat's EMR integration capabilities because they can use EMRs without completely restructuring their workflow. She also praised the Emdat technical team and help desk. Emdat thanks Sally for agreeing to share her story.

Madison area and industry publications are as excited about our new facilities as we are. Emdat was featured in the following media:

Looking for a medical transcription consultant? Brenda Hurley, a friend of Emdat, is available to help. Brenda has been a medical transcriptionist for nearly 40 years and offers confidential consulting services in medical transcription compliance, quality assurance, education, technology and workflow processes.

Brenda is available to:

A recent article in the November issue of For the Record, Healthcare Jumps on the Mobile Bandwagon, examines physicians using smart devices to help make the care process run more smoothly. In an effort to increase flexibility in physicians' workflow, healthcare facilities and companies are developing iPhone apps that interface with scheduling and patient information systems and/or allow providers to dictate into their smartphones.

Emdat Mobile, Emdat's app for the iPhone and the Windows Mobile platform, is among the companies mentioned. Kevin Saliga discusses Emdat Mobile's ability to allow physicians to download their patient schedule and record their dictation directly into the mobile device.

Emdat now has training videos available exclusively to Emdat clients that cover the setup and operation of our products.

Current Emdat clients, to access Emdat Video Training:

• Log into InCommand
• Select your MTSO Maintenance Tab
• Open the Advanced Maintenance sub-tab and select Video Training.

The training window will show the available videos on the left. When you click on a video, it will start playing on the right.

This is the first of many videos Emdat will have available to users. We will be creating a site specific to MT issues accessible from InScribe, and we will allow MTSOs to grant access to some videos to their clients through InQuiry.

If you have suggestions for topics, please visit our HelpDesk Request page and click on the Feedback icon, or add comments below.

Thanks to the support of all our partners, Emdat is continuing to grow. However, our existing office location can no longer support our growth; we are out of space. We are moving on Saturday, October 23rd to the following address: Emdat, Inc., 6180 Verona Road, Suite 200, Fitchburg, WI 53719-1946.

Please send hand written signatures other communications to this address. Please be aware that our phone numbers have NOT changed. The addresses for Payments and Accounting also have NOT changed. Payments should still be sent to our Chicago address lockbox, and Accounting correspondence should still be sent to our Louisiana PO Box.

With our new (and roomier) location, we will be able to provide the high level of support you expect of Emdat.

Emdat, Inc. now has a facebook page.  Join our community of fans!

Below are details on what is new in each application.

Comment Tagging Through InCommand, MTSOs will be able to create Comment Tags -- canned notations about a transcription. Via InScribe, an MT will be able to choose one or more Comment Tags to apply to a transcription. Comment Tags can be indicators such as “Missing Patient Information” or “Could not Understand Dictator”. A color can be associated with each Comment Tag. Through InQuiry’s Review folder, a medical facility will see the Comment folder icon in the color of the chosen tag, and will be able to filter transcriptions by a given tag. This functionality will be extended to other folders in a future update.

MT Instructions Through InCommand, MTSOs will be able to enter MT Instructions on a Document or Dictation Template. These notes will be presented to the MT in InScribe when the template loads. The MT will have the option of suppressing this note after the first time they view it. The MTSO will have the option to prevent the...

On Tuesday, September 7, 2010, Emdat will be making InScribe 4.97 available for download. On Monday, September 20, 2010, our web applications will be deployed to our servers, upgrading them to InQuiry and InCommand 5.8. Below are details on what is new in each application. Please note that some of the features in the InScribe release on the 4th will only be available after the associated InCommand updates are deployed on the 20th.

Comment Tagging Through InCommand, MTSOs will be able to create Comment Tags – canned notations about a transcription. Via InScribe, an MT will be able to choose one or more Comment Tags to apply to a transcription. Comment Tags can be indicators such as "Missing Patient Information" or "Could not Understand Dictator." A color can be associated with each Comment Tag. Through InQuiry's Review folder, a medical facility will see the Comment folder icon in the color of the chosen tag, and will be able to filter transcriptions by a given tag. This functionality will be extended...

Emdat Mobile for iPhone is reviewed in a post today on iMedicalApps.

Blogger Felasfa Wodajo, MD notes that he's been an Emdat user for 3 years, and finds that the app is "a very nice advance over using a digital dictaphone and special software to upload dictations."

In case his readers (his primary audience is doctors) don't know about Emdat, Dr Wodajo provides details about Emdat's medical dictation and transcription suite of software applications, mentioning, specifically, the potential impact of functionality like DaRT on the healthcare industry. He also cites our recently released white paper, "Facilitate EMR Success."

iMedicalApps is a online medical publication written by...

Fitchburg, WI (July 20, 2010) - A new method of populating electronic medical records (EMRs) that pulls patient information directly from a medical transcription enables physicians to keep their daily workflow the same, according to a white paper released today by Emdat, a provider of web-based medical transcription software.

Most EMR systems on the market today require physicians to personally scroll through an extensive list of checkboxes for every patient they see.  As a result they're forced to spend a large part of their day entering data into a computer.  Entitled "Facilitate EMR Success: Discrete Reportable Transcription Shifts Documentation Burden Off Physicians," the white paper cites a finding by the AC Group, a health care technology consultancy, that a physician who sees 40 patients a day will spend an average of 140 minutes entering patient data.

By contrast, Emdat's Discrete accurate Reportable Transcription, or DaRT,...

We’ve got an app for that! A brand new application is available in the iPhone App Store for Emdat account holders. Emdat Mobile for iPhone allows providers to obtain a listing of their scheduled appointments, perform dictation, and even review and complete transcriptions from their Preliminary folder. Even clients that do not send us an appointment listing can still create new dictation and review transcription using the Emdat Mobile product. (Note: iTouch and iPad devices will also work with the Emdat Mobile product, however iTouch users will need to purchase a separate microphone to perform dictation). This is a free download from the App Store.

ITHeathcare News, CMIO.net:,...

In a continued effort to supply high quality, reliable service to its clients, Emdat has delegated its fax services to ESKER. Emdat selected ESKER because of its extensive experience and impressive workload capabilities, required to handle the 4,000 faxes a day that Emdat's autofax system generates. With ESKER, Emdat clients can now fax internationally. Additionally, Emdat will be able to channel more energy into core development rather than delivery.

ESKER is a global fax server leader with nearly two decades of experience and over 80,000 document automation servers installed. ESKER On Demand service provides high volume capabilities, internal detailed reporting and a more stable, modern infrastructure.

Emdat launched its new quarterly newsletter "Between the Lines" this month. Sent to current and prospective MTSO clients, the enewsletter strives to keep recipients up to date on Emdat's products and services, EMR integration, and industry news.  

To subscribe to the newsletter, please send an email to enewsletter@emdat.com

Providers and MTSOs who use Emdat can now populate EMRs with information entered by transcriptionists rather than physicians, allowing doctors to focus on patient care and potentially leading to significant cost savings. By relieving physicians of this time-consuming data entry responsibility, which ultimately reduces the average number of patients he or she can see in a day, DaRT eliminates what has been a major challenge to the successful adoption of electronic records. "For some time, electronic medical records have promised to improve patient care and lower costs,” said Randy Olver, chief executive officer of Emdat. "By enabling physicians to use these systems without sacrificing the time they can spend with patients, the DaRT solution helps providers turn that hope into a reality.”

Doctors can continue to create notes or dictations using their preferred method and send them to a medical transcriptionist, who enters the information into an electronic form. The contents are then uploaded to an EMR as...

Look for Emdat at The 21st MTIA annual conference in Daytona Beach, FL, April 28th - May 1st, 2010. CEO Randy Olver, President Steve Palmisano, VP-Technology Jeff Olver, VP-Sales Bob Haugen and Director of Business De velopment Chuck Strain will be in attendance and manning our brand new 10' x 20' booth. Stop by Booth #13 and say hi! 

ADVANCE, provider of multiple healthcare-related publications, Web sites, and services, brought together some of the leading professionals and representatives of top companies in the field to discuss the future of transcription and how it will affect MTs—both now and down the road. Emdat CEO Randy Olver gathered with Tracy Boesch, TransTech Medical Solutions, Jay Cannon, Webmedx, Michael Clark, MedQuist, Peter Durlach, Nuance Communications, Inc, Dianna Hall, CMT, AHDI-F, Covenant Healthcare, Barb Marques, CMT, AHDI-F, to discuss the challenges MTs face in the changing health care environment, the impact changes will have on recruiting new MTs into the field, and whether the perceived reputation of the profession is well-deserved. Read the article here:  All Hands on Deck: ADVANCE Roundtable Discussion of the MT Profession

Emdat CEO Randy Olver, along with over 75 fellow members of the Association for Healthcare Documentation Integrity (AHDI) and the Medical Transcription Industry Association (MTIA), convened in Washington, DC for the organizations’ fifth-annual Advocacy Summit, March 23-25, 2010. The HITECH and subsequent proposed regulations concerning “meaningful use” of certified EHR systems have prompted the medical transcription sector to educate legislators on the significance of securing continued access by physicians to the dictation-transcription process.

Attendees met with their local state-elected officials and discussed the importance of dictation and transcription in the future of healthcare. Randy spoke with Wisconsin Senator Herb Kohl (D - WI) and Wisconsin Representatives...

I recently met Marianne Kleen from Textware Solutions at the AHDI meeting and she expressed how happy many medical transcriptionists were that they were able to use Instant Text within Emdat's InScribe typing platform. Marianne gave me this hyperlink to an excellent article.

Instant Text is a great productivity tool used with Emdat's InScribe.

Textware Solutions, developer and publisher of Instant Text, counts among its customers a large number of Emdat users happy to increase their productivity in the process of clinical documentation. While working in Emdat they can seamlessly utilize the knowledge base of their Instant Text glossaries that contain the medical words and phrases they have to deal with every day. The unique features of Instant Text allow them to have tens of thousands of words, drug names, phrases, addresses right at their fingertips with...

Emdat, a world leader in online-based medical transcription software, is taking on a leadership role with the Health Story Project. Health Story develops and promotes standards that support the flow of information between narrative documents and electronic medical record systems (EMR ).

"As a provider of transcription software and data storage to thousands of medical transcription companies and healthcare providers around the globe, Emdat is well situated to provide meaningful insights for the critical work Health Story is doing," said Randy Olver, Emdat CEO.

As part of advancing Health Story goals, Emdat leaders will provide strategic direction for the project, speak at industry events, serve as media spokespeople and continue sculpting its technologies in accordance with the project’s standards.

“Emdat’s direct commitment to Health Story supports further development of specifications for the transfer of information from narrative document types directly to EMR systems,” said Health Story...

Emdat is proud to annouce its Gold membership in the Medical Transcription Industry Association (MTIA). As a MTIA Gold member, Emdat will be highly visible leader within the healthcare industry and an important contributor to national healthcare policy. MTIA is the world's largest association for medical transcription service organizations. It is a not-for-profit trade association serving the needs of medical transcription companies, vendors, and health information management professionals.

MTIA 2010
Emdat will be attending the Medical Transcription Industry Association (MTIA) national meeting in Daytona Beach, Florida, April 28th - May 1st, 2010.

AHDI 2010
Emdat will attend the Association for Healthcare Documentation Integrity 31st Annual Convention and Expo in Austin, TX, in 2010.
 

AHIMA 2010
Emdat will attend the American Health Information Management Association Convention and Exhibit in Orlando, FL, September 25–30, 2010.
 

RANDY OLVER NAMED EMDAT CEO, WILL LEAD NEXT PHASE OF GROWTH FOR MEDICAL TRANSCRIPTION SOLUTIONS PROVIDER

Fitchburg, WI (Nov. 5, 2009) – Emdat, a world leader in online-based medical transcription solutions, has tapped Randy Olver as its new CEO, effective immediately.

Emdat’s founding partners, who remain actively involved in the business, selected Olver to serve as CEO of the 10-year-old company. Steve Palmisano, one of the founders who had been CEO, will serve as president.

“Randy’s diverse business experience is exactly what we’ve been seeking to guide Emdat to the next level so that we can continue providing world-class transcription products and services to our clients,” Palmisano said. “We’ve tripled in size in the past five years and, looking forward, our business needs have grown dramatically.”

Emdat, which experienced double-digit growth during the difficult business environment of the past year, remains committed to its core business model of providing medical transcription...

Are you ready to have some fun? Emdat is again hosting it's Users Group meeting December 9-11th 2009 in New Orleans, LA. This is a great opportunity to learn more about Emdat's suite of web based applications as well as network with other MTSOs who have chosen to utilize the Emdat platform. You can register by clicking on the link. Please come join us for an opportunity to develop some long lasting business relationships.

Emdat is proud to annouce its membership in the Medical Transcription Industry Association (MTIA). MTIA is the world's largest association for medical transcription service organizations. It is a not-for-profit trade association serving the needs of medical transcription companies, vendors, and health information management professionals.

How medical transcription will be affected by a Nationalized Health Care Record is a common question these days.

All of the soundbites that are in the air definitely keep us thinking about the future, and we've had many discussions about this. The most likely probability is that there won't be significant change at a national level, due to all of the healthcare lobbies, etc. Under a new administration, there may major reforms in this area followed by major changes in healthcare, but I think the likely hood of that is very slim.

That said, EMR systems are still emerging, pushing medical facilities to "reduce transcription costs" by using Voice Recognition and Templating features of their systems. With that in mind, we are moving forward internally with many development efforts to stay on top of this.

First, Voice Recognition tops our list, and several of our clients are ramping up.  We believe the technology partner we've gone with for Voice Recognition will exceed the claims made by other vendors, keeping us in play for facilities that want to go with this technology.

...

Emdat is planning on attending the upcoming MTIA  (Medical Transcription Industry Association)  in Louisville, KY.  The meeting will be held from April 22-25, 2009. Emdat will sponsor a booth with plans to meet with any current MTSOs as well as any new prospects who might be interested in improving their dictation and transcription process flow via Emdat's web based platform. The TASP model is easy to implement and one of the best methods to populate  EMRs via HL7 interfaces. Software as a service is growing in popularity because their is no upfront costs or maintenance required.

We are very excited to have Laura Lowe join Emdat's marketing team. Laura comes to Emdat from a large physician practice in Chicago where she was manager of marketing communications and graphic design. Laura's available to help our MTSO clients with marketing support. You can reach her at 608-270-6400 Ext. 373. As a UW-Madison School of Journalism grad, Laura's excited about coming back to Madtown and attending upcoming Big Ten football games.

If you are a medical transcription service organization or medical facility looking to improve your work flow process you might want to take a look at our flash presentation. Emdat has tried to address the needs of our clients by offering our software as a service. By supplying a totally integrated suite of web based applications, Emdat has helped many transcription organizations grow their businesses and many medical facilities streamline their transcription process. 

Emdat is planning on attending the Annual Clinical Assembly of Osteopathic Specialists in Boca Raton, FL from Sept. 11-13th. We will be working in the OTTC booth. We also will attend the upcoming Arkansas MGMA meeting in Eureka Springs, AR from Sept. 17-19th working in the eMedDox booth. In October Emdat will be attending the Illinois Primary Health Care Association Leadership Conference in Galena, IL from Oct. 8-10 working with Mayfield Transcription.

Emdat has a new corporate headquarters at :

2940 Chapel Valley Rd.

Fitchburg, WI 53711

NEW PHONE: 608-270-6400

It was brought to my attention that Emdat's InScribe transcription application can be useful in assisting visually impaired medical transcriptionist when using an application called Jaws. I wanted to pass the following information along to anyone who might be interested.

We received this message from a physician in Australia who stated "My patient is Visually Impaired only and has perfect hearing. I would very much like to speak to you regarding the mechanics of using Jaws with the InScribe application. There are quite a number of people who have a significant visual handicap who are excellent typists (medical transcriptionists) and desperate to find gainful employment, not only from the financial point of view but also the social one."

Emdat is planning on attending the upcoming MTIA (Medical Transcription Industry Association) meeting in Long Beach, CA. The meeting will be held from April 23-26th. Emdat will sponsor a booth with plans to meet with any current MTSOs as well as any new prospects who might be interested in improving their dictation and transcription process flow via Emdat's web based platform. The TASP model has become a simple model to implement which improves work flow process for many MTSOs.

Emdat will be attending the upcoming Bones meeting which will be held in Charlotte, NC. Bones is the National Society of Orthopaedic Administrators. Our feelings are that we will be able to meet many key administrators in a discipline which utilizes dictation and transcription services quite frequently. Additionally we are hoping to expand our relationships, in terms of interfacing, with the many Electronic Medical Record software companies. Currently we have interfaces completed with Allscripts, NextGen, Misys, ECW, MediTech, Cerner, McKesson, Epic and many more.

If you have doubts about the security of where and how your data is stored you will be able to sleep better at night once you review this site. Emdat has invested our money and time with Equinix, the best partner for securing your mission critical operations. I had the opportunity to tour the Equinix facility in Chicago recently with Jeff Olver (CTO Emdat) as well as one of our prospective Medical Transcription Service Organizations. Obviously MTSOs should be concerned about the security and reliability of the center where their data is stored as nothing is more important or critical to their day to day operations. Equinix offers five levels of security which is designed much like the Federal Reserve. Additionally Equinix offers five nines of up-time which is the best in the business. I know many of you have not had a chance to tour this facility so I encourage you to take the virtual tour by clicking on the link above. Believe me you will...

Emdat will be having its second annual Users Group Meeting in beautiful Las Vegas, Nevada. The dates will be December 9-11 at the Golden Nugget. We encourage you to register early as there is a cost saving. The theme for this years conference will be "Staying The Course".  Emdat promises to offer as much excitement as last years meeting in New Orleans. We hope you all can join us.

Emdat is a suite of web-based applications that completely automates the preparation, routing and delivery of the entire dictation, transcription and documentation process. Emdat begins with the proven foundation of traditional dictation and adds web-based cost-saving features to give clients a fully integrated solution that improves workflow, reduces cost, and saves time.

Previously, CEI transcriptionists -- all of whom worked off-site because of space constraints -- made frequent trips into the office to pick up dictations and drop off completed transcriptions. Along with being inconvenient, it was an administrative nightmare for CEI Project Manager Marsha Wylie. In addition, the company paid transcriptionists for each hour of drive time, making for a costly and inefficient combination.

Using Emdat, CEI's simplified its transcription process. A straightforward and user-friendly system, Emdat is easy to learn. CEI’s transcriptionists easily transitioned to the new online system. Administrators effortlessly...

Executive Healthcare Management Magazine's June edition mentions first steps to an EMR and lists Emdat's online web application which is used in the dictation/transcription process. Emdat has the ability to populate all historical transcriptions directly into a facilities electronic medical record thus making the EMR more valuable from the start. Since the interface is provided at no charge by Emdat, the solution is designed to improve the physician's operations as well as productivity.

Emdat is going to be airing 800+ TV commercials in the Fort Wayne, IN area from May 7th until July 2nd. This will be our first attempt to use Television as a medium for marketing  Emdat's ASP to medical facilities as well as transcription companies. Spot Runner has made this affordable to at least try TV and see what type of response we get. This commercial will be aired on CNBC, CNN, Discovery, Fox News, The Golf Channel, The History Channel, MSNBC, and the Travel Channel. This could be our first and last TV commercial but at least we can play it on this blog and possibly on You Tube. Tell us what you think? Are we all wet?

As a service to the medical facilities, Emdat, with very few exceptions, provides interfacing at no charge.  That is not always the case for EMR companies. At times, the costs charged for the EMR side of the interface can be prohibitive to moving forward. This is frustrating not only to transcription companies trying to win the business by providing better service, but also to the medical facilities which would realize  more value with their EMR. HL7 is the most common interface, but generally requires involvement for either the scheduling/demographic interface or textual/discrete interface back into the EMR.

If costs are prohibitive or cooperation is not forthcoming by the EMR software provider, we do have some options which are pretty straightforward and will save on cost. Don't panic - you can still interface to the scheduler to improve accuracy for the transcriptionist, and Emdat will store all transcriptions on our servers for as long as you are a client. Additionally we can bring past historical transcriptions...

Although it should be pretty straightforward to estimate your costs for transcription I have found that it has been very difficult to do a direct comparison without validating numbers. To make a complex comparison simple I will only look at billing by the line and not compare that to other methods of billing (page, word etc.). Generally speaking there are three ways to bill by the line:

The  standard which is 65 characters per line which will include spaces and punctuation. Basic (Gross) Method which counts each carriage return as a line. Microsoft Word which uses an embedded line word counter similar to the basic method. The differences in costs of these three measures can be as different as an apple to an orange.

Let me give you an example....

Emdat, Incorporated 857 Collins Blvd. Covington, Louisiana 70533

AAMT standard calculates this address as 1 line Basic (Gross) calculates this address as 3 lines Word calculates this address as 3...

Steve Jobs, founder of Apple computer, once said, "You can't just ask customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they'll want something new."  Nothing has made that more visibly true to Emdat then when we implemented our Feedback system.  Emdat *is* asking our customers what they want, and for the most part are trying to deliver.  That can be a long road, and more ideas will come in while on that road, but we believe it is a road worth traveling.

Emdat is a constantly evolving system.  We originally built the system around the ideas of the three founders, who brought in their experience working at various medical institutions.  But their experiences were one-sided - coming mostly from a technical background.  Steve Palmisano, one of the founders, recognized this early on, and has always kept the User Experience in the foreground of our application development.  Almost no piece of any application goes out the door without Steve (and more recently, Rich and his...

Some systems give transcription companies the option of charging for these lines.  Since Transcription Companies pay for the software that generates these lines, they have every right to charge their client for them.  Traditionally, anything on the final report is considered chargeable lines.  In the Emdat system, the transcription company or medical facility (whomever is contracted to use the software) not only have the choice of charging for headers and footers, but also patient demographic labels, clinician titles and credentials, first and last paragraphs of a transcription (if as a template).

The Print Template was first designed by Emdat and uses the technology built into Internet Explorer to allow for variable information before the transcription body and after the transcription body.  Because these variables are populated through setup screens and the transcriptionist doesn't type them, Transcription Companies can use Emdat without any additional expenses and usually save money by using Emdat. 

...

For the past 50 years, transcription has been the most efficient means of documenting a patient encounter.  During this time frame, the transcription industry has grown to be a multi-billion dollar industry annually.  Doctors love the convenience of dictating the encounter and the time savings they realize. Administrators frown each time they receive a transcription bill and are constantly trying to find a solution that will dramatically decrease or eliminate their transcription cost.

One popular solution to eliminate or reduce transcription costs is to implement an EMR type of system. The system allows clinicians or their staff to document the patient encounter on-line, thereby eliminating or drastically reducing the need for transcription. In a recent article titled “Transcription’s Coopetition with EMR’s”  by Bob Haugen, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Emdat, Inc., he explains the problems associated with such an approach. These problems result in loss of revenue for the health care facility.

...

Last month, Bob Haugen, Emdat's VP of Sales and Marketing, posted on our blog about "Coopetition".  It took me a while to figure that word out, but it's really a great word when describing our system in relation to other systems at a medical facility.  Some facilities have practice management systems, electronic medical records systems, dictation systems, hospital information systems, radiology systems, etc.  Quite a few of these boast a transcription module to go along with their primary function.  But what does each system have in common?  They all can integrate with Emdat.

Ever since Emdat started, we've prided ourselves on our simple integration strategy.  We developed tools to accept data from other vendor's systems, so that patient demographics, appointment information, and referring physician data can be easily accessed by typists and the medical staff.  We also created methods with which we could interact with EMR systems.  The key to our integration was that we provided most of these interfaces...

Emdat is proud to announce that development on our new PDA dictation application, "Emdat Mobile", is nearing completion and will be in beta in March.  Physicians with a PDA will be able to:

• Use their PDA to access their daily schedule
• Dictate against any patient
• Review prior transcription for patients on their schedule

In a recent artcle titled  "Affordable technology solutions for today’s busy practices", Shelly K. Schwartz of Cunningham Group identifies PDA devides as the wave of the future for the medical industry.

For more information on our PDA product, see the new Emdat Mobile link on our software page.  To participate in the beta, please drop us an e-mail at: beta@emdat.com.