Medical history is necessary in the diagnosis and treatment of diseases. Because of this, hospitals create an archive of their patients medical history. This archive serves as a reference to doctors and medical professionals in assessing the health condition of patients.
The process of archiving medical history is known as medical transcription. This is done by medical transcriptionists who convert handwritten medical reports into word documents. Collectively, transcribed files are kept in a hospitals library of medical records.

The need to maintain a library of medical history dates back in the 1960s. Organizing ten envelopes of medical history is easy, but maintaining files of a thousand patients is another story. Hence, medical professionals have devised a way to consolidate medical records of patients. They have adopted a documentation process from the manufacturing industry known as Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRP). In 1975, medical professionals have coined the term Medical Transcription to refer to this documentation system.

In the past, medical transcriptionists use manual typewriters in transcribing medical reports. They acquire handwritten reports of doctors and convert it into a typewritten document. Transcription becomes easier with the invention of electronic typewriters. The process further developed into a digital process with the use of electronic word processors. This has led to a more advanced archiving system of keeping electronic health records.

The library of medical history in hospitals has developed into an archive of electronic health records. Today, this is known as the Digital Archive of Medical History. Shelves and filing cabinets are converted into a computer database where doctors and medical professionals can access a patients medical history. Contrary to manual search of records, doctors can now access medical records through desktop computers. These computers are connected to powerful servers which contain records of patient information.

The archiving system of medical records has become more sophisticated with the development of the Continuous Speech Recognition (CSR) system. The CSR is composed of electronic voice recorders which instantly convert speech medical reports to digital word format. In this process, medical transcriptionists edit converted word documents to eliminate medical errors during the machines encoding process. Using both the CSR system and Digital Archives, compilation of electronic health records becomes a lot easier in hospitals and medical centers.

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