Home Forums Dragon Medical VS. Dragon Professional & Premium

At least once a day, someone asks us what the differences are between DMPE 2 (Dragon Medical) and lower-priced versions of Dragon such as NaturallySpeaking Professional or even Premium. The price gap between DMPE 2 and Premium is significant but so is the accuracy and features. Click Dragon Medical vs NaturallySpeaking https://www.knowbrainer.com/index.c...l-dmpe-2-to-dragon-professional-premium/ to see why Dragon Premium is a false economy for physicians.

Tom,
We know this was not your decision, and perhaps you are tired of hearing this, but the biggest barrier to using Dragon Medical is Nuance. Specifically, their decision to selectively gouge physicians (as opposed to other professions) by pricing the medical edition so high, and by locking us out of EMR's when using more appropriately priced versions.
Are we "cutting off our nose to spite our face" by refusing to buy the medical edition? Perhaps so. Maybe it is more efficient and even cost effective. All the more reason for Nuance to recognize the depth of anger they have unleashed with their price-gouging and unfair business practices.
I don't think it is wrong for people to use Dragon medical; I understand their decision completely. For now, I choose continue to give up some efficiency in return for making a statement to Nuance.

I don't use Dragon. I have a copy of Home V11, but never got around to installing it at home. I last used Dragon 9 and found that for the way I use AC, it did not save any real time. I agree that Dragon is gouging physicians,but they are aiming at large organizations, not the small group/solo docs, we are just caught in the corporate crossfire.
I do have loaded and occasionally use Win7/8 speech recognition, which is about as good as Dragon 9. Usually I only do a paragraph or so, and it works OK.
But...

One reason I would add to Tom's list that I saw (did not use so...) was that Dragon medical was installable on multiple computers. If you install it on 5 computers, it would be the equivalent of purchasing 5 copies of the pedestrian models. At $100 or so a pop, that would go a long way toward equalizing the price. Now if I'm wrong and it is NOT allowed to be used on multiple computers, shame on them. (Shame anyway, they should give it to me cause I'm a nice guy

You can put Dragon 12 on two computers, or maybe it's three.

The way I use it -- mostly on a remote client, since I prefer to do my heavy duty charting at home where I can play with my dogs and put my feet up-- I can use standard Dragon 12 in the remote window through RDP and it works quite well.

I'm told that the "speech engine" is the same in Dragon 12 and all the professional versions -- it's just the vocabulary that is different -- and maybe initially some of the word patterns that would be more medical than conversational -- but it is amazing how much medical vocabulary and even drug names are already in v12 right out of the box.

In any case, it is very accurate and quite helpful after training it (and me) for a while. Have to use a good microphone, but actually Nuance cell phone mike app is amazingly good.

Dragon is really picky though -- you can use it in any browser window EXCEPT this one -- it will shut down, imagining that this user board is an EMR! It also won't work anywhere in Updox.

John,

I completely respect your opinion and am not a fan of the sales model we are forced to work with. A copy DMPE2 can be installed on 4 computers and all other versions on 5 computers. As long as an end user uninstalls the software when retiring a computer (you get that activation back in your pocket)it can always be maintained on 4 or 5 respectively.

Tom,

The speech engine is indeed the same. Even worse than recognizing the name of the browser window, if someone even sends you an E-mail with Amazing Charts in the subject line it'll also shut off the microphone. They were very thorough in that endeavor.

Thanks Tom, I noticed!

I probably would buy the medical version if I could see that it would help me, but I suspect that the somewhat odd behavior of Dragon in the remote window is the result of the latency introduced by the remote connection, and that it wouldn't work any better than Dragon 12 if I were to use it at home or on the road.

Someone has done a lot of work to make this program functional -- and they should be paid for it. On the other hand, there are more and more charges, fees, mandates and general overhead requirements coming down on small practices -- with no compensatory increase in revenue. I have to save money where I can.

Tom

I have been using Dragon Medical on my office laptop for a few years. You mentioned that it can be installed on 4 computers. Can you please provide guidance? I really would like to dictate while at home and having dragon on another laptop would be a life saver. I'm a cloud user.

We also utilize a Remote Rx App on iPads for minimal AC charting while in the exam rooms. Is it possible to attach a microphone to iPads and chart through remote application. I've tried dictating remotely without success. I've also searched this forum without success. If it's possible, do you recommend any specific microphones for iPads? Any help is greatly appreciated!

Keidra,

the installation on computers two through four will be the same as the procedure used on the 1st computer. You just install DMPE 2 and activate it.

An iPad isn't a computer, even though Apple would have you think otherwise. The usual rules are not going to work. All you can do is use Siri or the local version of NaturallySpeaking on your iPad but it?s definitely not like dictating with Dragon Medical and not recommended. In fact, I don?t really recommend an iPad for anything but consumer use and I have 2 of them myself. If you?re serious about using a tablet computer, you should actually purchase a tablet computer with the Windows 8 operating system like the Microsoft Surface Pro 2/3 but note that I?m only using that as an example. The Apple iPad doesn?t have the proper operating system, amount of hard drive space or RAM.

You can use any analog microphone http://www.knowbrainer.com/NewStore/pc/viewCategories.asp?idCategory=82 with a iPad/iPhone Adapter ~ http://www.knowbrainer.com/NewStore/pc/viewPrd.asp?idproduct=423&idcategory=36 on an iPad but again, you?re not actually using NaturallySpeaking or working with an actual computer.

Agree with the negative views of Nuance due to their selective targeting of gouging physicians. I enjoy using the lower versions, dictate into word and copy and paste into AC. Not that big of a deal to do, but it is my way of sticking it right back at Nuance. If there were more of us taking a stand and refusing to use their rip off version of Dragon Medical they would get the message... I think. It really fires me up and I use Nuance as a shinning example of why healthcare costs are high and enjoy throwing them under the bus every chance I can. How they sell one version for $200 to Joe Public and try to stick it to MD's by charging $1600 for essentially the same version - regardless of what Nuance tries to peddle. The patients just shake their heads in disgust and that is how I feel about Nuance and their attack against MD's - disgust. Oh, and Nuance has made me into their future lost customer as soon as I find another software that works reasonably well. I will go out of my way not to use them due to the practice of gouging MD's.

It will be a while before anything comes along that has the power of Dragon.
Windows speech recognition doesn't even come close.

That said, it is unfortunate that the small office version doesn't come in at about $400. Then I would buy it. Large corporate practices have all sorts of ways to make money that small offices don't -- so presumably can afford to pay for the inflated cost of Dragon Medical.

I just use standard Dragon on a remote client, and have AmazingCharts on the office computer-- Dragon doesn't recognize the remote window as an EMR.
But that isn't perfect -- you have to have a pretty good internet connection for it to work.

WSR is close enough for me; although if Dragon Medical was more reasonable 400 or less I'd prob give it a spin

You can "remote" from inside your own network using RDP, and Dragon pro works fine