Outsourcing is a strategic tool that can provide organizations of all types with a competitive edge. By farming out certain tasks, organizations can focus resources and energy on their core competencies — those elements that they know best and which create the most value.

In today’s competitive health care market, outsourcing is a trend that allows health care providers to improve the quality of their care while maintaining or increasing profitability. Thousands of hospitals, clinics, IPAs and PHOs are deciding to outsource their medical transcription work to reap the following benefits:

Cost Savings
Many health care providers are deciding to outsource medical transcription work because they have learned not to make a critical mistake: comparing transcription costs based strictly on fees per line rather than on total costs. When health care providers farm out their transcription work to the right organization, they save in the following ways:

• Eliminating or reducing IT equipment needed for running an in-house transcription department.
• Decreasing fixed employment-related costs such as payroll taxes and benefits by instead relying on independent contractors.

In addition, outsourcing makes transcription costs variable, meaning that transcription costs occur in direct proportion to physicians’ dictations. And there is always the consideration of freeing up office space, often a highly sought-after resource at many health care facilities.

Less Reliance on Shrinking Labor Force
Studies indicate that the number of qualified medical transcription professionals is steadily decreasing in the U.S. The Medical Transcription Industry Alliance (MTIA) reports decreases of approximately 10% every year. In 1999, for example, there were 270,000 transcriptionists in the U.S., down from 350,000 in 1997. Many health care facilities are in danger of suffering an acute shortage of qualified transcriptionists in their local area, making outsourcing to a high-quality, national medical transcription organization a sensible move.

Better Focus and Utilization of Resources
In-house transcription departments often become a drain on resources as administrators and doctors divert time and energy to deal with training, technology, and clerical issues rather than spending their time on more important things like patient care.