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10 Jan 2004
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The future of MT

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Dear Friends,

I am republishing an editorial, from May 1999! Let me know, if this
was relevant at that time, or today...

Firstly there are two fallacies existing amongst the MT community
(in which I'll include businessmen):

The first, is more relevant to India. Every investor I have met,
sooner or later comes down to the 'fact' that MT is a low end IT
job. Nothing could be farther from the truth! I do concede that MT
in India is an IT enabled service i.e. it would not have been
possible without the net. That is where the resemblance ends. Good
and secure connectivity is a must and technology can be harnessed
to improve productivity, but the core skills are centered around
mastering the language of medicine ( which might be, and
frequently is literally, Greek or Latin to the uninitiated) and
appreciating the physician's requirements. It is a knowledge based
profession, and the knowledge has nothing to do with IT. Period.

Secondly I do not see any vision amongst those who spread the hype
about MT being an Industry per se, especially so in the developed
world. With accuracy, accountability, efficiency, reliability, and
usability being the key issues, the future lies with MT being
seamlessly integrated into Health Information Management Systems.
In simpler words we are moving to formatted electronic medical
records, speech recognition as a valuable tool, and transcribing
in realtime on the service providers server. That's the ASP
concept, which one and all visionaries are racing towards.

That leads to the core issue: what is the MT's future? This I talk
about globally, and not restricted by geography. Firstly, as I
visualize it, the MT's job profile will be drastically changed in
the next ten years, so much so that they might be known by some
other name by 2010. Yesterday's typist is called a data entry
operator today!

But closer to the ground I do not a visualize a society ten years
from now where anybody will be ready to accept dictations which
are mumbled,munched, slurped, flushed..... etc down the ear, be it
in India or the US. Physicians as a class are the major hindrance
to the growth of Medical Informatics, and resist any sort of
change requiring reorientation; yet society is the strongest
driving factor and will have the last word.

To sum it up:

1) The MT will stay.

2) The job will be done differently, possibly by a different name.

If you ask me to be more specific - I cannot. I might be a self
proclaimed visionary, however I am neither an astrologer nor a
soothsayer.

So the message is: Do your work well, and have a great weekend!!!

Ciao!

Maj (Dr.) Amit Chatterjee, SM
Strategist / Founder ~ mailto:amit@...
MT India ~ www.mtindia.org
"The Community of MT Professionals"

"It takes years to become an overnight success! Inch by inch, it's
a cinch."

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NEWS AND VIEWS :
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1) Tech firms defend moving jobs overseas

Worried about possible government reaction to the movement of U.S.
technology jobs overseas, leading American computer companies are
defending recent shifts in employment to Asia and elsewhere as
necessary for future profits and warning policy makers against
restrictions.

"Countries that resort to protectionism end up hampering innovation
and crippling their industries, which leads to lower economic
growth and ultimately higher unemployment," said the
Washington-based Computer Systems Policy Project, whose member
companies include Intel Corp., IBM, Dell Inc. and Hewlett-Packard
Co.

The technology group argued in its new report that moving jobs to
countries such as China or India -- where labor costs are
cheaper -- helps companies more readily break into foreign markets
and hire skilled and creative employees in countries where students
perform far better than U.S. students in math and science.

"Americans who think that foreign workers are no match for U.S.
workers in knowledge, skills and creativity are mistaken," the
trade group's report said.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/biztech/01/07/technology.jobs.ap/index
.html

2) Manipal starts BPO firm with American JV

Indian healthcare and education major, Manipal Group has formed a
joint venture with Florida based Sonix Medical Resources to form a
U.S. based BPO company focussing on the healthcare sector.
Christened Omega Healthcare Management Services, it will have
offshore BPO center in Bangalore called Manipal Omega Healthcare
Management Services. Sonix is a provider of outpatient diagnostic
and treatment services,

"This BPO will provide services including medical billing, medical
coding, transcription and tele radiology to both healthcare
providers such as hospitals as well as healthcare service
providers. The administrative functions account for $11 billion of
the $ 1.5 trillion US healthcare industry," said Om Soni, Chairman
of Sonix Medical Resources.

"We have been operating a BPO provision for our 40 odd clients in
the US where we employ around 300. We are rapidly expanding,
looking to add 100 more within the year and maybe all of them will
be in India," said Douglas Cassel, Chairman of Healthcare
Management Partners.

http://www.ciol.com/content/news/2004/104010911.asp

3) Speech Recognition in the Electronic Health Record
(AHIMA Practice Brief)

Speech recognition is not, in and of itself, the final solution in
clinical documentation. Whether recognition takes place on a server
in order to increase the productivity of transcriptionists or is
used directly by the dictator with the goal of eliminating both the
delay and expense of transcription, it should be viewed as only one
component of clinical documentation. This practice brief undertakes
to increase HIM professionals' understanding of how speech
recognition works, the driving forces that are shaping the current
and future applications of this technology, the benefits and risks
associated with both "front-end" and server-based use, and to
provide a glossary of terms, as well as illustrate work flow, tasks
and skills, and best practices.

http://library.ahima.org/xpedio/groups/public/documents/ahima/pub_b
ok1_022192.html

4) Brits collect cash to prevent job loss to India

So, if you can't beat offshoring, raise your skills! That seems to
be the motto of the call centre workers in the UK. Despite the
nagging complaints about the wrong accent and mismatched culture,
outsourcing to Indian call centres is here to stay. So, if the
Western counterpart of the bright young Indian grad has to compete,
they had better improve their skills.

Under pressure, the government seems to have pressed the panic
button and is now going all out to improve the skills of the UK
call centre worker.

Merseyside, a call centre hub, where over 13,000 people are
working, is the place where this initiative has been launched.

The UK Government's Northwest Development Agency has invested in a
three-year initiative to raise the profile of the call centre
industry and retain jobs in the region.

Under pressure, the government seems to have pressed the panic
button and is now going all out to improve the skills of the UK
call centre worker. The UK Government's Northwest Development
Agency has invested in a three-year initiative to raise the profile
of the call centre industry and retain jobs in the region.

The call centre job is now actually the hot job, thanks to India.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/414040.cms
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Thank you for your interest in MT India!

The MTIndia Team
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