Five Skills

Ajit Mahtre Manager, Logistics Spryance (India)

Angel-funded by the World Bank’s private investment arm, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), Spryance is one the fastest growing healthcare BPO companies. We have pioneered a unique home-based franchisee strategy in India to secure a high quality, cost-effective product, to service the US medical transcription market. Spryance is a major player in Home-based Medical Transcription (HMT) hence our skill set requirement is different than that needed for in-house operations.

In addition to a basic Graduate/ Masters degree and thorough understanding of the rules of transcription, we seek the following five skills, in order of priorities, for medical transcription and more so to work independently from home.

Proficiency in written English: Medical transcriptionists transcribe dictated medical (and legal) information from tape to written text using a computer and then proofread finished documents for accuracy and completeness. Hence, grammatically correct English is a prerequisite for this profession.

Listening comprehension: A potential candidate must possess the basic ability to listen and comprehend foreign accents, especially from the US. Though the listening comprehension skill improves with practice and time, lack of this ability is a drag on accuracy and productivity.

Good knowledge of medical terminology: Though a medical transcriptionist need not have complete knowledge of medicine, knowledge of medical terminology is imperative. Only then, will he be able to correlate different terms and deliver medically accurate reports. Imparting this skill is the primary focus of the medical transcription training programme.

Sound computer skills: Thorough operating knowledge of computers goes a long way in boosting a medical transcriptionist’s career prospects and is more pertinent to HMTs working alone from home without technical help. The transcriptionist needs to have an understanding of word processing application, Internet connectivity, Web searches, and standard computer applications.

Superior typing skills: Sound computer skills and faster typing speed is a preferred combination. Speed of typing is directly proportional to the productivity of a medical transcriptionist.