Dragon NaturallySpeaking 10

[ginnybinny]

I am a retired physician who is planning on going back to work part-time as a primary care doc at an Urgent Care clinic.  I am also starting to write a book about stress reduction.  I have heard that Dragon Naturally Speaking is the only voice-recognition software available.  I have also heard that the Professional 10 is more voice-sensitive and accurate than the Preferred 10 version.  I have read in CNET's reviews that the tech support from Nuance (the software developers) is inadequate at best.

My quandry is whether there is other voice-recognition software available, and whether I should use Professional or Preferred for writing my book.  I don't use "macros", don't access Outlook, but do access websites as references when writing. At some point I may want the Medical version, but not now. I don't think Professional can be upgraded to Medical.  However, at lot of my text uses medical terminology and am not sure if Professional can recognize medical terminolgy. 

Any users of Dragon NaturallySpeaking willing to critique and help me decide which way to go?  Any websites specifically for users of Dragon software that you know of?

Thank you, Dr. G

[Geek-9pm]

I use an earlier version of Dragon. Make sure you hardware is of good quality Dragon does not do well where other things are going on and if the hardware is under stress because of limited CPU power.

IMO you would do better to start with the lower cost version. The Medical version is priced for the active Medical Professional. In any case, you can easily corrent erros later.

Example:
You want to say "Trichinosis is infection with the roundworm Trichinella spiralis."

Dragon will goof that up. But you can train Dragon to recognize the way you like to say it. You can teach it to spell those words whenever you say "Trick Noses" and "Trick Spies" and from then on it will do the right word for you.

Yeah, the support may be poor, but they do have support and there are others who can help you with it.

I dictate with Dragon at about 90 words per minuets, which is a lot better the the 30 wpm I type. Sad to say, I can not use it in my living room because there is too much noise and/or I distract others in the house.