On 4 Oct 2004, at 9:51 PM, Tim Churches wrote:
On Tue, 2004-10-05 at 14:31, Andrew Ho wrote:Good point, maybe that's exactly what we aim for.
With sufficient digitizer resolution, network bandwidth, and storage
capacity, this might become feasible.
Have you tried current generation of tablet PC? I am interested to know
whether you think they are sufficient for capturing handwriting image.
Surely the whole point of computerised clinical information systems is that the information is captured in a computable form, which a raster image of someone's scrawl definitely isn't?
If aim is to convert handwritten scrawl to computable form, then the limiting factor is the accuracy of handwriting recognition algorithms, more than resolution, bandwidth and storage capacity.
Does anyone have any experience with the latest generation of
handwriting recognition software on tablet PCs? Last time I played with
handwriting recognition software, about 8 years ago, it left a lot to be
desired. Except for Grafitti on my PalmPilot, which I use every day with
adequate results, but I don't enjoy it. I'd rather have a keyboard.
Tim,
We're agreed on the ultimate goal of capturing the data as standardised fields rather than rasters of handwriting. However, I know of one local clinic where the latter is a milestone en route to the former. Combining transcription saved as text files with scanned lab reports and other handwritten documents, they now have a complete offsite backup of their entire paper charts, including patient signatures captured on HIPAA forms in pdf. Is it searchable like an EHR? No. Is the electronic chart primary? No, the paper chart remains primary. But perhaps more importantly, they have internalised in their clinical documentation workflow a key interim step towards a future dependency upon electronic data storage and retrieval. They are now fluent in backup archives, and this is before thinking about EHR. When they finally jump to EHR in a few years, they will have an easy walk to the next milestone compared to their sister clinics which don't currently scan documents, are still all paper and have limited experience with data backups.
[wr]
- - - - - - - -
will ross technical project manager alliance for rural community health 776 s. state street, suite 102-b ukiah, california 95482 usa [cell] 707.272.7838 [fax] 707.462.1503 http://www.ruralcommunityhealth.org
- - - - - - - -
