The process of healthcare has always depended on adequate documentation of the patient- healthcare professional encounter to draw inputs for providing quality healthcare and to use as the basis of billing for services. The process of documenting the patient- healthcare professional encounter has evolved from handwritten notes by the healthcare professional to exhaustive and informative reports transcribed by professional transcriptionists.

Medical transcription is a specialized skill requiring the right blend of people skills, processes and technology to produce accurate, speedy, secure and cost effective patient records. As this activity is not part of the core business of healthcare facilities the prudent option is to outsource the entire process of creating patient medical records to a professional service provider. The outsourcing decision is influenced by the accuracy, turnaround time, security measures and the price quoted by the service provider. However while outsourcing, healthcare facilities have to make sure that the service provider can deliver services as promised.