EMR Digital Ink Handwriting Recognition

Write Notes in Ink and Convert to Text

Thanks to the Microsoft Windows ® XP Tablet PC Edition for mobile pen computers, digital ink can be a pervasive input method in Medscribbler. "Inking" is a broad industry initiative that builds on the digital pen, digital ink, and speech technologies of Microsoft Windows ® XP Tablet PC Edition. With pen and speech input, wireless support, long battery life, and portability, Tablet PCs are definitely the next step in the evolution of the PC.

The Tablet PC allows users to input data with a digital pen as well as a standard keyboard, mouse or voice. Tablet PCs have special screens which use an active digitizer to enable users to write directly on the screen, to control their PCs and to input information as handwriting or a drawing.

This process, called inking, enables users to add "digital ink" to Medscribbler, which appears as natural–looking handwriting on the screen. The digitized handwriting can be converted to standard text through handwriting recognition, or it can remain as handwritten text. Both the converted text in typeface and the cursive handwritten text function equally well as data formats in Medscribbler™ that is, both forms of text can be displayed from past notes, sent as

a fax or converted to a PDF for export. Searching the text form or the handwriting form is also possible.

More Intuitive To Users

In many situations, handwriting is a more natural input method for placing data into applications. Inking makes Medscribbler as an EMR (electronic medical record) more convenient and available to users. Standing beside an exam table and moving from room to room are situations where fiddling with a keyboard is challenging.

Inking also allows users to insert a sketch or drawing, take free–hand notes, and annotate an existing document such as an X–ray. "Using a pen to input information into the Tablet PC is simply a more natural and productive way to work in many situations" says Microsoft ® Corp‘s Tablet PC expert Alex Gounares. "Using digital ink is so much quicker and easier than using a keyboard."

"Thinking in ink" — maximizing the possibilities of ink as its own data format — is the other great potential of the Tablet PC and inking, according to Gounares. "There are so many cool things that we can do with ink as ink," says Gounares.