I work with a hospital that has over 2000 doctors. I use IT, but find I still cannot get any faster than 150-200 lines per hour. Of course, my average is around 134 by the end of the day due to wearing down by doing a lot of straight typing.

I don't know what else to do. There's no way I can have a glossary for each doc, as I don't get the same ones every day, and it each doctor have their own verbiage. They all say something different; for example, one will say mg p.o. daily; one will say mg orally daily; even mg by mouth daily. Even when they do their physical exams, they are always different, except maybe 1 or 2 docs.

This is a verbatim account. So, I am at a loss on how to take advantage of IT to its fullest. Any ideas?

I am new to working for a national and only used IT for a year or so. Before it was a local hospital with only 100 doctors and I used AutoCorrect only, so I'm pretty "green" in all this. I don't have any idea how to use a macro or even make one, but am learning about commands in IT and so far, that has been somewhat useful.

My goal is to be able to do a constant 1600 lines or more daily. Am I dreaming?

First, you have my sympathy; it's really, really tough trying to make good lines with such a huge pool of docs that you really can't template anything.

Do you have access to your completed work? If not, can you start collecting text from your daily documents with something like the Community Harvester in the GnuT forum? Make a big compilation of the text from a week's or even a month's work, then try running the IT Glossary Compilation or running the text through one of the other lexical analyzers recommended elsewhere on this site. Look at the frequency analyses, and I think you will find that there are a number of fairly frequently repeating words and phrases that you don't have in your expander yet. Make sure your system includes shorts for all the frequent ordinary English words and short phrases, not just the medical stuff. Plain English actually makes up the vast majority of the words you type every day.

You're right that it isn't feasible in your situation to set up separate glossaries by doctor, but it may be helpful to do some by specialty or work type. Again, let compilations and frequency analyses be your guide.

Yes, I do have access to my completed work, and that's a good idea. As for frequent ordinary English words, there are a lot of 3 and 4 letter words in IT like with, was, etc., but I usually have them typed before I remember they're in IT. That's part of my problem. .After straight typing and using AutoCorrect for a long time, it's still hard to break that habit.

I'll see how this goes and report back as soon as I get another break. Thanks so much.

Sharon, whenever I add new items to Shorthand, I have a hard time remembering they're there too. I always type the long way and then remember the short way. I always make myself go back and do it again in the short form and I tend to learn pretty quickly when I do that.

Also, do you keep your hint window open as you type? After using Shorthand for 8 years, I just started doing that (didn't have enough RAM before), and I mean it has seriously improved my production.

Have you gone through this site and snagged all the lists people have already made? there are tons of shorts available where many of them are just plain English phrases that are said a lot. Some of them are pretty long, but if you have a system of abbreviating them you should be able to find them pretty easily by putting in the first few letters and glancing at your hint box as you type. Make sure you have a system before just importing a bunch of stuff. It won't do any good to have tons of entries if you can't find them later.

I know you're frustrated now, but it is possible to increase your production. I work on a very large account -- I have no idea how many doctors, but I do know I could work all day long without recognizing any of the dictators -- but I still pull off 300 lines per hour and my Shorthand saves me 65% of my keystrokes.

Good luck!

Yes, I always keep my hint window open. Otherwise, I'd be even slower. My memory is shot so I must rely on that.

I have also gone back and retyped the short to help me remember. It helps sometimes, but not always.

I have cut and pasted into notepad and printed out a list, of the most common phrases with their shorts and have that in front of me, and that has helped a little bit, but that list alone is 6 pages long and is only from 's' through 'x'. That has helped but only if I look at it.

I think it's just a matter of learning, but I don't think my brain wants the exercise anymore.

Habit is our enemy! I know this personally, and don't we all. It sounds as if the habit of straight typing is what you're up against and must break. I can't add much to the advice already given, but remember, concentrate on phrases rather than words. Always.

Meanwhile, just to help train your brain against straight typing, why not start with two-word phrases and "systemize" them? You know, first two letters of each word. Or another method if you prefer. This is so easy to remember that you won't have a problem. And do it for the English stuff, too. Big-time! Don't type the word "trouble" and then the word "sleeping." Or "breathing." See what I mean? Anyway, my thought is that you begin with that, then longer phrases, and then before you know it, you won't be able to remember the last time you typed the word "was" by itself. Straight typing should be any MTs nightmare, in my opinion. I know it is mine!

Any particular thing(s) during your day that take up time, that you could automate? Things like emails to supervisors, looking up info at particular sites, pulling up documents to check on something - think about all those type things, if applicable.

No, nothing takes up my time that much. I took all the doctors and put them in a glossary by their last name so I no longer have to look them up on the site. I usually don't need to look things up online, very rarely. The only time I need to email anyone is when I have problems with the program like today, losing the voice portion. That, alone, took over a half hour to correct with tech support.

I love long phrases. Jest call me lazy. (smile) I tried to retrain my brain to use the first letter of each word like IT does for over a year, but that didn't work. I noted that I usually type the first 3 letters of the first word before even looking at the advisory and, since some of my new add-ins were put in that way out of habit from AC (plus the first initial of the rest of the words), they come up quickly. So now I'm trying to change everything to do it that way, but then I run into the problem where they aren't first on the advisory and have to move them to the top, or they don't show up at all. I have memorized some shorts, but not all.

I'm a dummy where macros are concerned and sometimes I can't even do a command right. Like today, I tried to do the command for jumping to the vitals but it didn't work. I really love the command feature and use the "dn" for decimals. I even made a command for commas for platelet counts, etc. Much, much better. I would love to get into macros because there are so many good suggestions on this board, especially the one Ed made for Preop and Postop diagnosis but I've been doing something wrong there too. So I just copy and paste.

I have normals for some OPs, ROS, and PE, but not all, only the ones I get most often.

BTW, I have emoticons checked, but they don't show up when I post or reply to a message. Is that me doing something wrong again?

About the emoticons, please check under "My Controls", then Options and Board Settings. (Not sure if you meant it's checked there, or just at the screen when you submit a post). If you have it enabled there and still don't see them, it's a setting in your browser.

Sharon, you sound anything but a dummy to me. If a certain macro or command is not working properly for you, feel free to post in the pertaining thread. We'll help if we can!

I use auto correct in Word. How do I get the hint box?

The hint box is with the Shorthand program. If you don't have this yet, I highly recommend investing in it or a similar program. It is far and away better than using AutoCorrect in Word. Their website is www.pcshorthand.com

It is a little window that floats in the corner of your screen and suggests shorts that you have previously entered. That way, you don't have to memorize all your shorts -- you can just put the first letter or so and narrow down your choices by adding the next letter, etc., until you see the choice you want. Then you hit enter or the corresponding F key, and boom, there's your expansion!

Thank you! The company I work for now uses Word, but I will keep your advice in mind for the future.

Shorthand is a program that you use in addition to Word. As as a matter of fact, Shorthand will work anywhere -- Word, WordPerfect, message boards, anywhere you could possibly think of that you would type text.

It works in conjunction with your word processor and replaces or assists AutoCorrect. (I use both). Seriously, it really makes your life MUCH easier. Are you working on your employers' equipment? If you are working on your own, I HIGHLY recommend downloading the software and evaluating it for the trial period. If it is your company's equipment, you will most likely have to ask their permission first.

If I seem persistent, it's because I have had this software since shortly after I began working in MT (8yrs), and I seriously can't imagine typing anymore without it! It has done so much for my productivity. It now types 70% of my text for me.