Nuance Communications, Inc.  today announced that Epic electronic health record (EHR) customers can now use voice-enabled clinical information capture through Epic Haiku for the iPhone™ and Canto for the iPad™.

“Epic’s mobile applications provide valuable EHR access both inside and outside the hospital or clinic environment,” said Dr. Jeffrey Westcott, medical director, Cardiac Catherization Lab, Swedish Medical Center. “For me, it’s important to have the on-the-go accessibility provided by tablets and smartphones. Using voice recognition to document a note in Haiku or Canto allows me to seamlessly dictate the patient narrative into the electronic healthcare record using a workflow that suits my style and ensures my focus can remain on patients.”

Nuance’s cloud-based, medical voice recognition builds off of its proven success with the more than 450,000 clinicians worldwide who use Nuance’s Best-in-KLAS clinical documentation solutions on the desktop every day. By leveraging the existing desktop-focused interface, Nuance enables Haiku and Canto customers to connect to Nuance Healthcare’s voice recognition in the cloud. This connectivity will provide maintenance-free access and automatic updates of personal speech profiles, medical vocabularies and user-defined shortcuts. Customers can also enter progress notes, histories and physical exams via voice.

“Clinicians’ work lives are not conducive to a desk and chair; they need the flexibility of a mobile environment to support their workflow – between exam rooms, clinics and hospitals – and all at a moment’s notice,” said Janet Dillione, executive vice president and general manager, Nuance Healthcare. “Still, issues surrounding the adoption of mobile technologies remain, including limitations surrounding laborious touchscreen keyboards. With voice-enabled mobile EHR applications, clinicians can enjoy the benefits of the Nuance-powered functionality anytime, anywhere.”