Whether it’s penning down a message, taking notes, or completing a form, handwriting is an essential part of our daily activities. Hence, it is always among the first things people learn when they were a child.
It’s no secret that doctors have to deal with tons of paperwork every day, and legibility is a key component to their communication skills. But why are doctors’ handwriting so bad, especially their signatures? What’s the big deal with doctors’ signatures? Is it just laziness? Are they just really busy?
Let’s face it, doctors spend years studying in school and going over notes. They still don’t get it right when it comes to handwriting. It always surprises me when I see an illegible prescription from a doctor. So, perhaps you’re wondering why is this? The answer can be quite complicated but I’ll do my best to explain.
Why is Handwriting Important
Although modern technology has changed drastically with the way people communicate these days, writing on a piece of paper is still significant. Some transactions require your penmanship, such as affixing your signature or filling out a bank form.
Good, eligible handwriting is a relevant factor in understanding the information you want to convey or share. That is why experts correlated it to a person’s characteristics or personality.
When your penmanship is well-written, almost everyone would say that you’re a professional, neat, and organized person. However, it is not always the same scenario for other professionals like doctors.
Doctor’s Handwriting
One way or another, you were able to get a hold of a handwritten doctor’s prescription. No matter how you try to squint your eyes, so just you can read what’s on the receipt or letter, it doesn’t help. You still can’t get through or understand what’s on his notes.
For this reason, some people joke around about having bad penmanship as one of the essential requirements for any graduating medical student to become a doctor. What makes it more thought-provoking? Some doctors admit that, at times, they can’t read their handwriting.
So, what more for others who will read it? It will probably be a disaster. Statistics state that the sloppy penmanship kills over seven thousand (7,000) patients every year, and up to this date, it remains to be a relevant problem in medicine.
Why Do Doctors Have Bad Handwriting
And so, most people wonder why do doctors have bad handwriting? Many have come up with ideas and reasons for their illegible penmanship. Nonetheless, below is a list of the valuable and justifiable reasons why your physician’s prescription is hard to decipher.
These are the five (5) dominant causes of doctor’s sloppy penmanship.
· Top 5 Reasons Why Doctors Have Band Handwriting
There have been numerous reasons raised by the medical professionals why they write, unintelligibly, most of the time, if not all the time. And these are the top five (5) that are prevalent and prevailing.
1. Time Management
Doctors are always on the go. They’re working round-the-clock and pumped up with a long list of patients every day. So, each second is essential for them.
Spending an hour with every patient will sacrifice their productivity and the patients they’re able to attend. Hence, they’re always rushing. Due to the number of patients, who are waiting in line, they need to see in an extremely limited time, taking all information down is more relevant than having perfect penmanship or writing it perfectly.
2. Hard to Spell Medical Words and Jargon
Aside from keeping their pace so they can attend to all their patients, one of the struggles that the doctors have to face in jotting down notes, medical reports, or prescriptions is the jargon and hard to spell medical words.
Inarguably, there are medical terms that are out-of-this-world or unique when it comes to spelling. Hence, some doctors try to scribble it to either cover the error or truncate the words, as admitted by a few doctors.
Some medical jargon also creates confusion for patients, and thus, they write it that only the pharmacists or fellow physicians can understand.
While their brain is analyzing a diagnosis, not to mention the other patients’ illnesses and treatments, it’s quite hard sometimes to keep up with some of the spellings of medical words, such as amitriptyline and epididymitis.
3. Volume of Paperwork
One of the most justifiable reasons why doctors have illegible handwriting is due to overwhelming prescriptions and reports to note.
In the medical or healthcare industry, everything should get documented. Whatever a doctor says behind closed doors, it needs to get jot down in writing as a record of physical evidence of what transpired during admission and the patient’s medical history.
So, doctors have already long days working, added with tons of overwhelming notes and reports, which, eventually, equate to an extremely tired hand. And in the course of time, those hand muscles tend to get worse due to overworking.
Since they were students, they have been consistently taking notes. Thus, their hands get a little tired of writing intelligibly.
4. Tired Hands
Apart from their brilliant minds and perfect vision, one of the most overused body parts of doctors is their hands. So, in a whole day’s work, their hands must feel exhausted or extremely tired. That is why they seemed to scribble words when they write something.
5. Gradual Deterioration of Handwriting
Over time, due to consistent high volume and time pressure, the doctor’s handwriting slowly leads to becoming scribbles.
Although not all doctors have bad handwriting and some of them used to have nice penmanship before it became illegible, as time passes and with the volume of rigorous works, they have to deal every day, coupled with lots of time pressure, leads their handwriting to gradual deterioration.
The increasing number of deaths and incorrect medicine intake has led the medical industry to make changes to this problem. By saying so, all doctors are highly encouraged to use electronic forms of diagnosis reports, prescriptions, medical certificates, and other relevant medical records to curb the surge.
Besides, using technology in processing data or sending reports these days is more efficient, faster, and more accurate.
Conclusion
In closing, there are justifiable and significant reasons why doctors tend to write illegibly. Time, pressure, and volume of work and paperwork, as well as the number of patients, in-waiting highly contribute to the scrawled or unreadable penmanship.
Even so, not all doctors have unintelligible penmanship. There are other physicians who can write competently. It is just that the world has this notion of stereotyping doctors having bad handwriting.
Due to the indecipherable notes and prescriptions, doctor’s bad handwriting contributes greatly to the number of deaths. Studies showed that pharmacists and other healthcare workers tend to give and administer, respectively, wrong medications because of doctor’s unreadable prescriptions.
As a result, the medical industry highly urges all physicians and health professionals to use electronic forms in releasing prescriptions and other related medical reports to stop or mitigate the problem.
FAQs
Why Do Doctors Have Bad Handwriting?
There are a few reasons why doctors have bad handwriting. One reason is that they are often in a hurry and don’t have time to write neatly. Another reason is that some words in medical terminology are very long and difficult to spell, so doctors may shorten them or write them in abbreviated form. Finally, some doctors may have poor fine motor skills, which can make it difficult to write neatly.
Is a Doctor’s Handwriting Bad Because of the Speed of Service in the ER?
Some people may speculate that the speed of service in the ER could contribute to bad handwriting, as doctors may be rushing to see and treat patients. Additionally, doctors may be writing in a hurry or in dim lighting, which could also lead to less legible handwriting.
What If You Can’t Read Your Doctor’s Writing?
If you can’t read your doctor’s handwriting, you can try asking them to write more slowly or to print instead of writing in cursive. You can also ask them to spell out any medical terms that you are unsure of. If you are still having difficulty understanding what your doctor has written, you can ask them to write it down again or to explain it to you in person.
Is there a way to avoid being victimized by illegible handwriting?
Some experts believe that illegible handwriting is partly to blame for errors in dispensing medications. If a doctor writes a prescription for a medication that is unclear, the pharmacist may dispense the wrong medication or the wrong dosage. To avoid this, it is important to make sure that your doctor writes clearly and legibly. You can also ask them to print the prescription instead of writing it in cursive.
Is doctor’s handwriting partly to blame for errors in dispensing medications?
If you are concerned about your doctor’s handwriting, you can always ask them to write more slowly or to print instead of writing in cursive. You can also ask them to spell out any medical terms that you are unsure of. If you are still having difficulty understanding what your doctor has written, you can ask them to write it down again or to explain it to you in person.