To support healthcare professionals with clinical documentation during consultations, SingHealth, Singapore’s largest healthcare cluster, is currently testing a new tool.
Note Buddy, described as a digital writer, can take notes of patient interactions in the country’s four official languages: English, Mandarin, Malay and Tamil.
The tool, developed by SingHealth’s Division of Digital Strategy, records patient conversations and transcribes them via speech-to-text software, then produces structured medical summaries using genAI.
Healthcare IT News visited the Diabetes & Metabolism Centre at Singapore General Hospital, a tertiary hospital within the SingHealth network, to see Note Buddy in action.
Verbalization and speech recognition
Dr Goh Su-Yen, Senior Consultant at SGH’s Department of Endocrinology, led a demonstration of the tool through a mock patient consultation with a member of our team. Our colleague spoke in a mix of English and Tamil.
Please note: Buddy created a rough transcript of the consultation, followed by a summary with clearly defined items such as medical history, social activities, ongoing symptoms, and even a possible prognosis for the clinician’s assessment.
However, we noticed that the system did not fully capture all spoken Tamil words, as the words were pronounced too quickly or used too sparingly.
Dr. Goh said that if a clinician knows a patient’s preferred language, they can select that option in Note Buddy. She further explained that multiple languages can still be detected and translated by the platform, as long as they are clearly spoken in most of a sentence.
The tool also responds to prompts from the clinician. When our colleague indicated that he had “pain in his mid to lower back,” Dr. Goh responded with the medical term commonly used to describe that area (i.e., thoracic region). This detail was recorded in the medical summary.
Dr Goh pointed out that Note Buddy recognised her as the doctor in the call, adding that the tool could also recognise input from other people – such as carers – who were also present during the call.
Refinement by clinicians still crucial
We did find one small inaccuracy in the summary. For example, the tool included the word “anorexia” in the summary after hearing that our colleague was taking Anarex to treat his back pain. He also mentioned that he had digestive issues when taking the medication on an empty stomach.
According to Dr Goh, this could possibly have been caused by the system recording her advice that “it is always good to eat before painkillers” or by the word Anarex not being pronounced clearly enough.
She emphasized the need for clear verbalization and post-consultation checks to optimize Note Buddy.
“That’s why we make sure clinicians know that (Note Buddy) only documents conversations. For example, for a cancer patient, I might have plans like chemotherapy that aren’t fully formulated during the session. Then I can revise my notes after the consultation,” Dr. Goh said.
Improving patient care
SingHealth has launched Note Buddy to help healthcare professionals focus on interacting with patients during clinical consultations and reduce the administrative burden associated with documentation.
In addition to note-taking and multi-language support, the tool’s features include customizable prompts and secure note retrieval. Clinicians can only access their own notes to maximize patient data confidentiality, and the platform deletes notes from the system after 1 month for routine data protection.
Dr. Goh shared, “Using Note Buddy has allowed me to interact with my patients more meaningfully and reduce the cognitive burden of manually typing out what was discussed. I find the notes captured by Note Buddy to be accurate.
“The system can even selectively prioritize and capture the relevant and pertinent parts of the patient’s medical history. I can now give my patients my full attention during our consultation sessions.”
Please note: Buddy is currently accessible to all SingHealth institutions.