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When you think of a doctor in a hospital, you probably don’t immediately think of typing on a keyboard. However, hospital employees spend a large part of their time on administrative tasks, which therefore leads to high typing. Research from UMC Amsterdam shows that doctors who type faster aren’t necessarily more positive about that administration.
The research of the Amsterdam scientists was published in the prestigious British Medical Journal. Every year, in the Christmas edition, the magazine publishes a study on a light-hearted theme. An investigation with a wink.
Researcher Alex Schuurman from Amsterdam UMC speaks on the NPO Radio 1 programme News and Co that he and his colleagues hoped their research would bring to the British journal. Despite the lighthearted subject matter, the study had serious overtones, the researcher said.
Schuurman says when he first walked into a hospital as an intern, he noticed how much administration is involved. “You don’t expect that if you want to be a doctor.” He saw that little research had been done on the relationship between typing speed and the work experiences of medical personnel and decided to dig deeper with his colleagues.
More than 2,500 Amsterdam UMC employees participated in the survey earlier this year. They had to type a text about Santa in 60 seconds. The researchers then analyzed the number of words typed per minute in relation to the accuracy of the text.
Big age differences
Not entirely unexpectedly, the differences in typing speed between people of different age groups have been striking. “The older you are, the slower you type,” says Schuurman. “People under 30 type nearly twice as fast as people over 60.”
Differences in typing speed between medical specialties were also examined. Internists – specialists who deal with internal organs – are fast typists, as are neurologists. Microbiologists were the slowest in the test.
Although the latter group work more slowly on a keyboard, microbiologists experience administrative tasks less stressful than faster typists. Research shows that this is also true for other departments that, like microbiology, don’t have many patient contacts. According to the researchers, this has to do with the workload involved in patient contact.
The administrative workload becomes insufficient
All in all, the employees of the UMC Amsterdam have a negative attitude towards the administrative workload. “Many doctors and nurses say they spend 3 to 5 hours a day dosing,” Schuurman points out. As a result, the administrative burden on average is largely unsatisfactory. “Our study shows that typing faster isn’t the solution. So something else needs to be done.”
