By Joe Petro, Senior VP of Healthcare Research and Development, Nuance
Twitter: @NuanceHealth
Physicians are looking for ways to be more efficient when it comes to documenting patient care and are adopting cloud-based clinical speech recognition to achieve this.
My son recently picked Dr. Seuss’ “Green Eggs and Ham” for his bedtime story. As we read it together, I was struck by how much the poem applies to health IT adoption. A few years ago, most healthcare organizations and physicians were extremely skeptical of the very technologies they now rely on each and every day to get the right information to the right place in a timely manner.
We are seeing this now with cloud-based clinical speech recognition technology.
Two years ago, HIMSS conducted a survey that found that only 46 percent of hospitals reported they would consider using cloud-based technologies. Fast-forward 24 months through new health IT regulations, increased merger and acquisition activity in healthcare, two iPhone releases, the introduction of new wearable technologies, and the eruption of the Internet of Things that brought with it all the associated conveniences of having 24/7 access to personal content at your fingertips, and it’s easy to see how quickly things change.
We are seeing an equilibrium emerge between consumer expectations of technology and the development and adoption of user-friendly healthcare solutions. Physicians and their healthcare leadership teams are looking for simple wins that help enhance patient care and improve efficiencies throughout their organization. Those who once felt strongly that they would not use cloud-based clinical speech solutions in a clinic or through an app, on a desktop or in a lab, are now changing their tune.
Today, clinical teams are using a combination of desktops, laptops, tablets, and mobile devices to access and share clinical information. They need a secure, reliable, and flexible deployment architecture that supports them—wherever they are, whatever they are doing, whenever they need it. We have a motto: “We provide cloud-based clinical speech technology to any device, anywhere, anytime,” which means we can answer with a resounding “yes” when our clients ask us:
- “Can you deliver speech and understanding on the phone?” Yes.
- “Can I embed that on my application—not just your application?” Yes.
- “Can I deliver speech understanding to thin-client hardware terminal I have in a lab?” Yes.
- “Can I put it on the desktop?” Yes.
- “Can I run it on a web browser?” Yes.
- “Can I do it in this virtual environment?” Yes.
- “Can the physician be at home on the VPN and get access to your speech and understanding?” Yes.
Just like Sam-I-Am, those who were first skeptical are now finding that cloud-based clinical speech recognition provides them with secure and reliable access wherever they are, whenever they want it, on any device they choose. And that is the goal of every great piece of technology: to support people exactly how and where they need it most.
This article was originally published on Nuance and is republished here with permission.