With the goal of ensuring industry-wide guidelines to ensure that clinical data is accessible, shareable, secure, and translates across different languages, applications, and locations, the HL7 Clinical Document Architecture (CDA) is being embraced as the standard of choice. However full interoperability is still challenged by lack of commitment on the type and structure of such standards, and the breadth of interoperability. A common framework and leadership is essential to deliver the efficiencies anticipated by the use of this currency.

The HITECH Act, which includes $ 17 billion of the ARRA, is earmarked to support widespread adoption and utilization of interoperable health information technology, including electronic health records (EHRs).

Clinical data capture, dictation and transcription help ensure that physician narrative is fully preserved to satisfy meaningful use criteria. Simple point-and-click templates can not achieve these requirements.

It is patent that transcription vendors will face a challenge with the rollout of EMRs, but few will argue that they are essential quality gatekeepers of physician notes before being pushed through EMRs for safekeeping, compliance, coding and billing.

Transcription services must diligently monitor HIPAA guidelines. This requires that they invest in dedicated personnel and establish formal processes to ensure that they are in compliance with HIPAA and the ARRA. Similarly, healthcare providers need to make sure that their transcription services are following these guidelines and have the appropriate support mechanisms in place.

Transcription companies must comply with increasingly stringent privacy and security rules. This in fact has had the unlikely consequence of undermining the offshoring of transcription work to foreign enterprises. U.S. Based transcription companies are highly valued.

In trying to satisfy meaningful use criteria new roles can be played by medical transcription companies in the areas of data abstraction, data mining, accuracy and quality and compliance.
Even with the adoption of EMRs, dictation will remain the preferred method for physicians to document their clinical notes. background speech recognition will be increasingly utilized with the support of transcriptionists as editors.

A recent study produced by Physician Practice 2010 Physicians Practice Technology Survey, revealed that seventy eight percent (78%0 of physicians are not using voice recognition software while twenty two percent (22%) are incorporating it into their daily practice. The Physician Practice survey further revealed that of the respondents who said they were using voice recognition software, fifty two percent (52%) said the technology generated some savings and 48 percent said they have stopped using a transcriptionist altogether.