One of the most popular phrases in society today is “Google it,” and it’s almost impossible to go a day without hearing that phrase. Fun fact: following that societal trend, the word “Google” has actually been added to the Oxford English Dictionary as a verb. As a Medical Transcription/Healthcare Documentation Specialist, you may not be aware that you can utilize Google in many different ways to find the medical terms you’re searching for.
Here are our top 10 tips for getting the most out of Google.
You don’t have to know the exact spelling of a word. You can start entering the word and Google will ‘suggest’ similar words. You don’t need to hit ‘search’ every time because the term you are looking for could be a suggestion generated by Google. See Google’s guide on searching.
Google ignores common words and characters such as where, the, how, etc., but if you think that a common word is essential to get the results you want, you can make it essential by putting a plus (+) sign in front of it. If you want Google to ignore a certain word or phrase that has been generated in search results, you can put a minus (-) sign before that word or phrase, and those results will be excluded.
To do a precise search, surround the phrase with quotation marks. For example: “laparoscopic appendectomy.”
In most search engines, you can use a character to stand in for any word or letter in a search phrase. Google’s most common wildcard character is an asterisk (*). Google uses stemming technology to find variations of each word in your search. You can do a wildcard search by inserting an asterisk (or up to 10 asterisks) to replace words before your search phrase. For example: coca cola was invented by *.
Knowing the definition of a word is crucial when typing up a report, especially a medical report. Google can provide word definitions if you enter ‘define: ‘ and then your word.
A synonym is a word or phrase that has the same meaning as another word or phrase. Look for synonyms by entering a (~) in front of the term.
Capitalization is not necessary for Google searches. For example, canada will generate the same results as Canada.
Plural forms of words are not necessary. For example: lung will generate the same results as lungs.
The Medical Transcription/Healthcare Documentation Word Seeker is a custom Google Search Engine designed specifically for Medical Transcription/Healthcare Documentation Specialist and their specific needs. It works by searching 2873 quality health and medical transcription websites including medical journals, medical equipment websites, doc finder, and medication finder sources. Try the Medical Transcription/Healthcare Documentation Word Seeker.
A specific division geared toward Medical Transcription/Healthcare Documentation searches is called GoogleMT.
That’s it! That’s our top 10 tips for google. If you’re interested, you can access other help features in Google, or you can check out this website which has further resources and word list help for MTs.
Every Medical Transcription/Healthcare Documentation Specialist has their favorite website(s) that they frequently refer to when doing research. At CanScribe, we have our Stedman’s Medical Dictionary, e-books, and other bookmarked websites. We advise adding these resources to your bookmarks and tabs, especially the resources on tips 9 and 10 if you are an MT. For additional Medical Transcription/Healthcare Documentation resources, check out our MT/HDS Resources page for helpful materials such as dictionaries and grammar references.