Hi, everyone! I'm having trouble with vital signs. I have them in every report and I would like to know the best way to do them to save time. I have a glossary for temperatures, but I don't have glossaries for BP (too exhausting) or respirations or weight. I do have a glossary for pulse oximetry. Anyway, it seems a waste of time to input the temperature, Ctrl+ right and input the BP reading, etc. I think it may be faster to type the words every time but I wanted other opinions. If I am confusing anyone, an example is below.

Vital Signs: [temperature short goes here which is t983, for example], blood pressure, respirations, pulse oximetry is % on room air, weight is

The above is in my normal/template for each doctor but it's annoying with all the Ctrl+right going on! I've tried making those jump things but I'm in Dictaphone and 1) our Macros are turned off permanently and, 2) it doesn't seem to work when I put a marker in IT using the Commands feature and try to use F11 to jump from place to place (F11 is our jumping key; I don't know if it's the same for every Word-based platform). I was thinking of changing the above to:

Vital Signs:

and then just filling it in as I go...unless there's a better way?

Thanks in advance!!

Sorry the font is so big, I need to make an eye appointment!

There are glossaries available on this site for BP,heights, stuff like that. Other people have already done all the work and shared them with all of us! Search around in the IT section.

Amanda, is your ESP function turned off in EXText as well as the macros? You could most definitely make an ESP for this: temp (pause), blood pressure (pause), etc. and just fill in the numbers. ESPs easy enough to set up, and you can assign them shorts just as you would in IT. ESPs expand with either the space bar or the enter key, and there is a function you can use to suppress a trailing space if you don't want it.

I use both ESPs and Shorthand, so I don't think there would be problems with using them along with your IT.

I'll check in here tomorrow before I start work in case you have any questions, because I have to be in EXText to see the ESP menus and functions....

happy saturday

Carol, that is so sweet of you! I had this weekend off so I was away from the computer the entire time, but the offer was great! I do use ESP with IT. I didn't know about the Pause feature, though. I use ESP mostly for the small words (and, was, have, the), but I'll have to give the vitals a try with ESP. Thanks so much!!

Shipaddict, I didn't know anyone had completed a BP glossary. We don't do heights but I'll take a look around the site. Thank you!

Amanda, as I was creating a couple of new ESPs today (been a long time, forgot what the menus look like!!!), I thought I would pass on that you can find the Pause feature and some formatting options thus:

Open the ESP main menu (our EXText uses control-control), click on New. You will find the Pause, etc. by clicking on the Advanced button.

One caution: at the hospital I tx for, new ESPs are not saved permanently until you exit EXText. They will still work in that session before they are saved, but if for some reason the program crashes and you don't exit properly they will be gone. And using the SAVE feature, at least for us, is a total screwup, because it loses all the ESPs the hospital has put in (they put the housestaff dictator numbers/names in there). I don't know if this applies to all installations of EXText, but caution is STRONGLY recommended!

If there's anything else, let me know.

happy tuesday