Dictate the consult notes before you call in the next appointment, and have the voice notes from your visits transcribed. Everything is transcribed on the practice computer, and weights and doses can be written as figures.
Every animal leaves a record, written sometimes for a colleague and sometimes for an owner who is not a vet.
Consult notes
Reason for the visit, history, clinical examination, weight, tests and treatment, in the animal's clinical record. Written between appointments, while an emergency can come through the door at any moment.
Surgical and anaesthetic records
Anaesthetic protocol, doses worked out from body weight, technique, complications and recovery instructions. The morning's operations follow one another, and the records get written in between.
Referral letters
The letter that goes with the animal to a specialist, and the report that comes back to the referring vet. It covers the history, the tests already done and the question being asked.
Discharge instructions for owners
After surgery or a stay in the hospital: medication, doses, what to watch for and the next recheck. It has to be clear to someone who is not a vet, and it goes home with the animal.
Farm visit reports
In farm practice: the animals examined, what you found on site and the measures you advise the farmer to take. Prepared on the road between two farms, far from any keyboard.
Day to day
What pushes your notes back to the evening
Notes that wait until consults are over
Today
Appointments run back to back. While the owner clips the lead back on, the examination shrinks to a few abbreviations in the record, and the full notes wait until the evening.
With Dictadoc
Switch on the dictation key. Once the animal's record is open, one press starts recording and shows the floating panel, and a second press sends the dictation. Turn on text insertion as well, and the notes go into the field where you left the cursor.
Dictation key
Text typed into the field
Visit notes stuck on your phone
Today
In farm or equine work, findings get dictated in the car, between two farms or two yards. Voice notes pile up on the phone and get typed up back at the practice in the evening, when the details are already fading.
With Dictadoc
Back at the practice, drop the files from your phone or dictaphone onto a report. Dictadoc works through them in turn, on the computer. A word drowned out by the engine noise can be replayed in its take before you correct it.
Recording import
Dictation in several takes
Doses in mg/kg to retype by hand
Today
Every dose is worked out from the animal's weight. Dictated, doses come back spelled out or half in figures, and the owner's discharge instructions get corrected line by line before the animal goes home.
With Dictadoc
With "Numbers, units and dosages" switched on, you dictate "fifteen milligrams per kilogram two times a day" and read "15 mg/kg, 2 times a day". Dictadoc does not calculate or check any dose: it writes what you said, and you review it.
Numbers, units and dosages
Dictation example
A dermatology consult, dictated before the next appointment
Adult dog presented with skin lesions on the abdomen.
What you say
Six-year-old male neutered Labrador presented with abdominal pruritus for ten days [full stop] weight thirty-one kilograms [full stop][new paragraph] papules and pustules on the ventral abdomen [comma] epidermal collarettes around the lesions [full stop] no fleas or flea dirt on combing [full stop] cytology of a pustule [open parenthesis] neutrophils and cocci [close parenthesis][full stop][new paragraph] likely superficial pyoderma [full stop] cefalexin fifteen milligrams per kilogram two times a day for three weeks [comma] chlorhexidine shampoo two times a week [full stop][new line] recheck in three weeks [full stop]
What Dictadoc writes
Six-year-old male neutered Labrador presented with abdominal pruritus for ten days. Weight 31 kg.
Papules and pustules on the ventral abdomen, epidermal collarettes around the lesions. No fleas or flea dirt on combing. Cytology of a pustule (neutrophils and cocci).
Likely superficial pyoderma. Cefalexin 15 mg/kg, 2 times a day for three weeks, chlorhexidine shampoo 2 times a week.
Recheck in three weeks.
The words in brackets are commands. Dictadoc replaces them with punctuation and line breaks.
With the "Numbers, units and dosages" setting turned on.
The settings list every command for your language.
Privacy
What you dictate stays on your computer
Transcribed on your computer
Your computer transcribes your voice itself. Nothing you dictate is sent over the internet.
Erased on quit, if you want
Choose to keep nothing, and reports and recordings are erased when you quit Dictadoc.
Encrypted on your disk
The reports you keep stay in an encrypted database whose key is held by your system keychain.
Questions
Before you try it
Is Dictadoc suitable for veterinary work?
Dictadoc was designed for human medicine. It transcribes everyday medical vocabulary, much of which both professions share. Doubtful words are checked against a list of human medical terms, with no breed names, no species-specific terms and no veterinary medicines. Names you dictate often can go into your vocabulary.
Can I dictate the examination in front of the owner?
You can, but Dictadoc does not tell voices apart. It is made for your dictation, not for transcribing a conversation: if the owner speaks during the take, their words may end up in the text. The safest option is to dictate once the consult room door is closed.
Does Dictadoc fill in record fields such as weight or temperature?
No. When Dictadoc writes into your practice software, the text lands in one piece wherever the cursor was, as if you had typed it. It is not split across several fields, and there is no connector to veterinary practice software. Enter the weight in its own field, or keep it in the notes.
Can the owner's instructions go out by email?
Dictadoc does not send anything itself and does not produce a PDF. Copy the instructions and paste them into an email or into Word: paragraphs and lists are kept.
Do I need a signal to dictate on farm visits?
No. Transcription happens on the computer, with no internet. Internet is needed just once, for activating the licence and downloading the model. The application runs on Mac and PC, not on a smartphone: on the road, use your phone to record notes, or dictate directly if you take a laptop.
Install the app on Mac or Windows, buy a licence, then enter the key you receive by email in Dictadoc. The licence year starts on the day you activate it.
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