In the hospital setting, we have some rather elaborate and expensive systems in place the sole purpose of which is to increase efficiency. For example, we have a transcription service, thus allowing us to dictate our notes rather than having to type them. This is simple economics. Allowing us to dictate rather than having to type saves time for us doctors, thereby freeing up time to see more patients during the workday resulting in more income for the hospital. The extra revenue this generates more than justifies the added cost of hiring transcriptionists to type out everything for us. Why then do we continue to insist upon deliberately decreasing the efficiency with which we do things? The most prevalent and striking example of this phenomenon in the modern age is using our cell phones to communicate via text rather than voice. Many very smart people were paid very well to labor on the problem of how we might talk to someone who is a great distance away without being dependent on pesky wires which limit our mobility. After much perseverance, they found a solution - the cell phone! So why in God's name do we continue to insult these hard working innovators by taking something which they designed specifically to enable us to communicate very efficiently and deliberately perverting its in such a way as to enable us to communicate less efficiently? Consider, if I get a text from a friend asking WHAT I'M UP 2 DOG? (which took longer for my friend to enter into his phone than it would have for him to simply say) and I reply with NOT MUCH, U?, we've both spent valuable time and money on these messages and we are no closer to having plans for the evening than we were before.

Our textual habits seem to have carried over into the hospital setting. Quite often I'll get a text-page inquiring about whether a particular lab value has come back yet. I will then have to page this person and wait for a call back so we can have a discussion about an abnormal bilirubin value, whereas if they had simply paged me with their callback number, instead of a text message, I could have initiated the bilirubin conversation straight away. Alternatively, I could reply with a text page of my own. I might reply with: YES, IT DID COME BACK. Then perhaps I would receive a later page: WHAT WAS IT? I could respond with 4.5 etc. I could also use a pair of scissors to mow my lawn and Q-tip to paint my kitchen but these things don't make much sense either.