Oncology Dictation for Staging Notes,
Germline Data, and Tumor Boards
Cancer diagnoses affect insurance, employment, and family decisions in ways that follow patients for the rest of their lives. Germline results extend that exposure to biological relatives. This is not data you want on a vendor's server.
Oncology PHI carries
consequences that outlast the encounter
A cancer diagnosis is not like most other medical information. It affects life insurance applications. It can surface in disability proceedings. It influences employment decisions in industries where it legally shouldn't but practically does. And when germline testing is involved, the implications extend to siblings, children, and parents who never saw you as a patient.
Cloud dictation tools route your staging notes, germline variant discussions, and treatment response documentation through vendor infrastructure. The vendor's server holds a record of what you dictated. That record is subject to breach, legal discovery, and retention policies you cannot fully audit.
VoicePrivate processes everything on your device. TNM staging, RECIST criteria, germline pathogenic variant findings, and tumor board case summaries - all transcribed locally, text typed directly into your EHR. Nothing leaves your machine.
Dragon / Nuance DAX / cloud scribes
- ↓ Oncologist dictates staging or germline discussion note
- ↓ Audio sent to vendor cloud infrastructure
- ↓ Transcribed on vendor servers, possibly retained
- ↓ Vendor holds patient's cancer data outside your governance
- ↓ Reachable by breach, discovery, and vendor data policy changes
On-device oncology dictation
- ↓ Oncologist activates hotkey and begins dictating
- ↓ On-device AI processes audio with oncology vocabulary
- ↓ TNM staging, RECIST, genomic terms corrected locally
- ↓ Text typed into EHR - Epic, OncoEMR, or any system
- ↓ No vendor ever receives or stores this data
Who uses VoicePrivate
in oncology practice
Oncology clinicians who rely on it
- Medical oncologists in infusion center and outpatient settings
- Radiation oncologists dictating treatment planning notes
- Surgical oncologists dictating operative and pathology correlation notes
- Hematologists and hematology-oncology specialists
- Gynecologic oncologists
- APPs and NPs in oncology practices managing follow-up notes
- Genetic counselors documenting hereditary cancer assessments
Typical oncology dictation workflows
- New patient consultations with full staging documentation
- Treatment decision notes citing NCCN guideline pathways
- Chemotherapy cycle notes with toxicity grading (CTCAE)
- RECIST response assessment at restaging CT timepoints
- Tumor board case presentations and summary documentation
- Germline and somatic genomic variant discussion notes
Oncology documentation
workflows by note type
TNM staging and clinical stage documentation
Dictate full TNM classification with substaging - T2aN1M0, Stage IIIA, AJCC 8th edition. The staging vocabulary covers solid tumor types including NSCLC, colorectal, breast, prostate, and bladder. FIGO staging for gynecologic cancers included.
RECIST and treatment response notes
Document target lesion measurements, sum of diameters at baseline and restaging, and RECIST 1.1 response categories without having to spell out criteria. Complete response, partial response, stable disease, and progressive disease terminology handled correctly.
Germline and somatic variant discussions
Dictate genomic findings from multigene panel testing: BRCA1/2 pathogenic variants, MSI-high status, TMB-high designation, EGFR exon 19 deletion, ALK rearrangement, KRAS G12C. These exact terms are recognized without spelling out each nucleotide change.
Multi-patient tumor board summaries
Rapidly dictate case summaries for each patient discussed at tumor board - working through 8-10 cases without waiting for cloud round-trips. Each note goes directly into the appropriate chart via cursor placement before each dictation.
Chemotherapy and immunotherapy notes
Regimen names (FOLFOX, FOLFIRINOX, carboplatin/paclitaxel, pembrolizumab dosing), cycle numbers, CTCAE toxicity grades, dose modifications, and treatment decision rationale all documented at dictation speed without spelling out drug names.
Radiation treatment and simulation notes
Treatment planning rationale, dose prescriptions (Gy fractionation), target volume definitions (GTV, CTV, PTV), organs-at-risk constraints, and treatment response assessments. SBRT, IMRT, and proton therapy vocabulary included.
VoicePrivate vs. alternatives for oncology
| Feature | VoicePrivate | Dragon Medical One | Nuance DAX | Freed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Audio stays on device | ✓ Always | ✗ Cloud | ✗ Cloud | ✗ Cloud |
| Works offline | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ | ✗ |
| BAA required | No - no data sharing | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Oncology staging vocabulary | ✓ TNM, RECIST, FIGO | Oncology specialty add-on | General clinical NLP | General clinical NLP |
| Germline / genomics terms | ✓ Included | Partial | Partial | Partial |
| Types into any EHR | ✓ Any text field | Integrated EHRs only | Integrated EHRs only | Native integrations only |
| Monthly price (per user) | $34.99/mo | ~$99/mo | Custom / enterprise | $99/mo |
Competitor pricing and features based on publicly available information. Subject to change.
Works on Mac and Windows,
with any oncology EHR
M1, M2, M3, M4 Macs
Neural Engine acceleration for sub-2-second transcription. Works alongside Epic SmartText, OncoEMR, iKnowMed, and any browser-based oncology platform. Macbooks are common in academic oncology settings - this is the fastest path.
Intel-based Macs
Supported on Intel Macs running macOS 13 or later. Slightly slower than Apple Silicon but fully functional for clinical dictation. No upgrade required to get started.
Windows workstations and laptops
Works on infusion center Windows workstations, clinic PCs, and personal laptops. No admin privileges required for single-user installation. Any 64-bit Windows 10 or 11 machine is supported.
Healthcare Edition pricing
Start with 5,000 free words - no credit card required.