In America, the average age of transcriptionists is 55 years old. Even though outsourcing helps pick up the slack for the lack of professionals in the field, it has its cons; one being the inability to manage the workforce you've outsourced to. Enforcing contracts that are overseas can also be a bit difficult (such as in the case of confidentiality breaches).
Management and Morale Issues
One of the biggest cons of outsourcing medical transcription work is the inability to manage the workers in the same way you would in-house workers. Also, the morale of your on-site medical transcribers may be affected when you outsource work to India, making them feel as though their jobs could be threatened. This will leave your on-site workers less focused on the quality of their work. Also, the Indian medical transcribers aren't well-versed with all areas of medical terminology, like with their British counterpart.
Overseas Contracts and Work Quality
Along with contracting overseas, there could be problems with miscommunications and misunderstanding of the contracts, inferior quality, missed deadlines and contract renewals. Since Indian medical transcriptionists are likely providing work for companies other than yours, they may not be completely focused on yours.
HIPAA Security Compliance
It was reported than a British investigative reporter was able to buy 116 U.K. Patient medical records from two salesmen that worked for an Indian medical transcription outsources company. This would be considered a major HIPAA breach in the U.S. Something like this could happen again from outsourcing to India companies. You wouldn't be able to fully control what gets leaked out, even if the contract forbids it. Dealing with Indian laws and U.S. laws could be difficult.
