A surgeon on the Health Record Committee voices a concern that, although he has been told that the operative report is to be dictated immediately after surgery, he has often had to deal with the problem of transcription backlog which prevented the report from getting on the health record in a timely manner. Your advice to this doctor is that when a known backlog exists, he should

Question

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When a transcription backlog exists and there are concerns about timely documentation, the best course of action is for the surgeon to write a detailed operative note in the record. This will ensure that important information about the surgery is documented and available to other healthcare providers involved in the patient's care. Providing the dictated tape or requesting a "stat" report may not be feasible or effective solutions in the face of a backlog, and requesting that administration hire more transcriptions may not be realistic in the short term.

A Surgeon on the Health Record Committee Voices a Concern