Several entries ago, I wrote about my experiences with Google Voice.  It is by far one of the best forwarding services available today; one of its features include transcription of voicemail to text.  The transription has been shockingly accurate for me…that is, until I started using my number to discuss medical-related issues. Take the follow excerpt a urogynecologist left for me:

Hi...I last changed her catheter on Feburary eighteenth. Uh, I placed a sixteen
French foley catheter over her suprapubic site...if you think it looks cruddy
you can exchange it out...

Here is the transcription from Google voice:

Hi...if I west change her catherine said you were eighteen i placed a sixteen
french pollack after for super P B X site...if you think it works cruddy
always replace it out...

The message was actually enunciated clearly in the voicemail, and the doctor did not have any weird accents (Egyptian or Bostonian).  Overall, the transcription was accurate, and I assume that these shortcomings will be promptly corrected after the Google bots scour this entry and flag the development team. (Yeah, I know you Google spider bots are lurking around.)

Hilariously, I initially thought the transcription was a spam solicitation. I was about to file a complaint to Google that they were selling my number to spammers, but then listened to the actual voicemail. An admirable first attempt, it was. But then again, how often do you use words like, “suprapubic”, “catheter”, and “foley” anyway?

computing medicine, tech