AI Scribe for Emergency Medicine
Transcribe Health drafts your ED notes while you work the board, so the history, exam, and decision-making are on the page by the time you disposition the patient.
Photo: engin akyurt / Unsplash
Emergency documentation, at the pace of the shift
Emergency medicine documentation is unlike any other specialty because you are never charting one patient. You are holding four or five in your head at once, each at a different point in a workup, and the note for the chest pain in bed 3 gets interrupted by an EMS call, a positive troponin, and a septic patient rolling through the doors. By the time you sit down to write, the details have blurred together.
The chart also has to carry weight it does not in clinic. Your medical decision-making is what supports the E/M level and what an auditor reads first. For a high-acuity patient that means the differential you ran, the data points you reviewed, and the risk you were managing all have to be on the page, not just the final diagnosis. A syncope workup that ends in discharge still needs to show why you ruled out the dangerous causes.
Transcribe Health listens through the encounter and drafts the note as you work: the HPI from the patient, the exam as you call it out, the MDM from your reasoning, and the disposition from your plan. You read it, correct anything, and sign. It does not order tests or make the call. It records the thinking you already did so you are not rebuilding it from memory at the end of a ten-hour shift.
Documentation Challenges in Emergency Medicine
- 1
Charting a full board at once, with constant interruptions from nurses, EMS handoffs, and new arrivals breaking up every note you try to finish
- 2
Capturing medical decision-making in enough detail to support a level 4 or 5 chart: the differential you considered, the data you reviewed, and the risk that justified the workup
- 3
Documenting undifferentiated complaints, chest pain, abdominal pain, syncope, where the note has to show your reasoning through a workup that may or may not land on a diagnosis
How Transcribe Health Helps Emergency Medicine
MDM Capture for High-Acuity Charts
Records the differential you talked through, the labs and imaging you reviewed, and the risk that drove your plan, so the note supports the level you actually worked at.
Workup and Disposition Documentation
Follows an undifferentiated complaint through orders, results, and reassessment, and writes up the disposition with the reasoning behind admit, discharge, or transfer.
Notes That Survive Interruptions
You can step away mid-encounter and come back. The draft holds what was said and picks up where you left off, so a broken-up shift does not mean a broken-up note.
An ED note, captured during the workup
An abridged chest pain encounter with a HEART score workup and disposition, drafted the way you would see it before signing.
54-year-old man presents with 2 hours of substernal chest pressure that started at rest, non-radiating, associated with mild diaphoresis, no nausea. Pain was 6 out of 10, now 2 out of 10 after aspirin given by EMS. History of hypertension and a 30 pack-year smoking history. No prior cardiac history, no known CAD. Denies dyspnea, syncope, or leg swelling.
BP 148/88, HR 78, RR 16, SpO2 98% on room air, afebrile. Alert, no acute distress. Heart regular rate and rhythm, no murmur. Lungs clear. No JVD, no peripheral edema. Chest wall non-tender to palpation. Skin warm and dry.
Undifferentiated chest pain in a patient with cardiac risk factors. Differential includes ACS, aortic dissection, PE, and musculoskeletal pain. ECG shows normal sinus rhythm with no ST-segment changes or T-wave inversions. Initial high-sensitivity troponin negative. Chest x-ray with no acute process, no mediastinal widening. HEART score 4 (history 1, ECG 0, age 1, risk factors 1, troponin 1), intermediate risk. Given intermediate risk and a single negative troponin, will place in observation for serial troponins and monitoring rather than discharge.
Admit to observation. Serial high-sensitivity troponin at 3 hours. Continuous cardiac monitoring. Aspirin 324 mg given. Cardiology consulted for stress testing versus CT coronary angiography per their protocol. Patient and family updated on the plan and reason for observation. Reassess after second troponin resulted.
Illustrative example. Not a real patient encounter.
Built for emergency medicine coding and your EMR
The note captures the data you reviewed, the number and severity of problems, and the risk that back up your ED E/M level. That is the detail auditors look for on a level 4 or 5 chart, and the first thing to slip when you are charting between patients.
- 99283ED visit, moderate complexity
- 99284ED visit, high complexity, moderate severity
- 99285ED visit, high complexity, high severity
- 99291Critical care, first 30 to 74 minutes
- 12001 / 12002Simple repair of superficial wound, scalp, trunk, or extremities
- 9301012-lead ECG interpretation and report only
- R07.9Chest pain, unspecified
- R10.9Unspecified abdominal pain
- R51.9Headache, unspecified
- R55Syncope and collapse
- I20.9Angina pectoris, unspecified
Fits the workflow you already have
Drafts drop into the EMRs emergency departments run on: Epic (including the ASAP module), Oracle Health (Cerner), and MEDITECH. You get the note type you are working in, whether that is a standard ED visit, a critical care note, or a procedure note for a laceration repair. It writes up the ECG and imaging interpretations you dictate. It does not read the tracing or the film and it does not replace your ordering system; you make the call and it records it.
What's Happening in Emergency Medicine
ED Physicians Spend 43% of Time on Data Entry, Only 28% on Patient Care
A study of 79 emergency physicians found they average nearly 4,000 mouse clicks during a 10-hour shift and spend 43% of their time on data entry vs. only 28% on direct patient care.
The ED documentation burden is acute. Ambient transcription during fast-paced encounters can shift the data entry vs. patient care ratio back toward clinical work.
Read more139.8 Million ED Visits Annually with 5% Projected Increase
Americans made 139.8 million ED visits in 2024. Projections show a 5% increase in inpatient utilization and 10% rise in inpatient days over the next decade, with behavioral health patients averaging 9-10 hour ED stays.
Rising volumes with constrained throughput demand faster documentation. AI transcription reduces per-encounter documentation time in a high-volume, time-critical setting.
Read moreED Crowding Consistently Causes Delays and Increases Complication Risk
A systematic review confirms ED crowding consistently delays essential assessments and treatments, prolongs length of stay, increases complication risk, and disrupts workflow efficiency.
Documentation delays contribute to the bottleneck. Faster, automated documentation during encounters improves throughput and reduces boarding-related workflow disruption.
Read moreEmergency medicine AI scribe questions
Can it keep up when I'm charting several patients and getting interrupted?
Does it document medical decision-making well enough to support my coding?
Does it handle undifferentiated complaints and negative workups?
How is patient information protected?
Does it connect to our EMR?
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