18.1.0 Release Notes
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18.1.0 Release Notes
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18.1.0 Release: nVoq Dictation, nVoq.Voice, nVoq.Administrator, & nVoq APIs
July 2023 - See Production Deployments for deployment dates.
For release notes for nVoq mobile apps, see:
- nVoq.Mobile Voice Version History - 18.1.0
- nVoq.Wireless Microphone for Android Version History - 18.1.0
- nVoq.Wireless Microphone for iOS Version History - 18.1.0
nVoq Dictation
The updates in this section impact all dictation clients, including nVoq.Voice and nVoq.Mobile Voice, as well as ISV partner clients using nVoq dictation.
- HTTP Dictations Fail Due to Inability to Connect to Gateway - In the 18.0.0 release it is possible for an HTTP dictation to fail to initialize due to an internal timing error, resulting in an error in Review & Correct. When this happens the dictation timeline on the Detail Review & Correct page shows no "Transcription started" message, and instead skips directly to "Audio set to done." The timing error was resolved to keep this from happening. (D-13232, 5/1/2023)
- Fix for Dictations Sending the a Word "Point" or "By" Instead of the Character - In the previous release STABLETEXT dictations could send the word "point" instead of a decimal point when a BOUNDARYREQUEST is sent around the same time as the decimal point. (D-13233, 5/1/2023)
- Small Improvements to Vocabulary & Mid-Dictation Command Accuracy - Minor tweaks were made to improve accuracy of user vocabulary and mid-dictation commands. (B-16681, 6/8/2023)
- Fix for Intermittent Problem with Vocabulary -In the last release there were some problems with user vocabulary which were causing profiles to fail, resulting in some dictations not having vocabulary and sentence modeling available (which could have resulted in poor accuracy). These issues have been fixed. (D-13246, 6/8/2023)
- Missing Words in Dictation Transcripts - Several customers have reported multiple words missing from final dictation transcripts, or even the entire transcript missing. The dictation server should always return words that are spoken (even they are incorrect) instead of just skipping over them. We have made an effort to improve this in the 18.1.0 release. (D-13252, 6/20/2023; D-13239, 6/20/2023)
- Fix for Rejected Dictations - In the previous release the dictation server could reject dictations and report being busy due to being stuck in a bad state. Dictation clients in this instance would receive a 503 response. This has been fixed. (D-13265, 5/22/2023)
All nVoq Products
- nVoq Password Recovery Notifies of 30 Minute Expiration - When using the "I forgot my password" option on the sign in screen for any nVoq product, the Password and Username Recovery page (which appears after you enter your nVoq username and click the Email Me Recovery Information button) will now state that the link in the recovery email is only valid for 30 minutes. That is also stated in the password recovery email that is sent to the email address associated with the username provided. Note: This feature is only valid for nVoq accounts. It is not applicable to users who sign in using an Okta or Microsoft SSO account. (B-17055, 3/29/2023)
nVoq.Voice
- No changes in this release.
nVoq.Administrator
- Detail Review & Correct Timeline Tab Persists After Clicking Next or Previous - When viewing the dictation Timeline tab on the Detail Review & Correct page in the 18.0.0 version of nVoq.Administrator, if you click the Next or Previous button the screen returns to the Review tab. In the 18.1.0 version of nVoq.Administrator the screen stays on the Timeline tab as long as the next or previous transaction is a dictation. (Only dictations have a Timeline tab.) This is the same behavior that occurred in earlier (pre-18.0.0) versions of nVoq.Administrator. If you are viewing the Review tab and click Next or Previous, the screen stays on the Review tab, but the default subtabs "Original" and "Corrected" are selected even if you were viewing other subtabs on the previous item. This is the same behavior as in the 18.0.0 version. (B-17169, 3/31/2023)
- Note Assist Audit Testing - You can now test audits against a clinical note to see if it will match assigned categories. The Add and Edit Note Assist Audit pages have a new Test tab that opens to a new screen where you can enter clinical note text and run it against categories in the audit. The test shows which categories matched, and which did not. Each category is assigned one of six colors. Words in the note that match are highlighted in the color that corresponds to the category. If you have more than six categories, the same color will be used for multiple categories. You can turn off the highlighting for any category to see which words are matching to it. (B-17033, 4/4/2023)
- Longer Organization Names Allowed - Per customer request, Company, Division, and Group organization names can now be 100 characters long, an increase from the previous maximum character length of 45. The character length applies when adding, editing, or cloning organizations. This new character length does not apply to Tenant names, which still have a 45 character limit. Organization names will be truncated at 59 characters in file name of system-generated sentence model documents that are collected by an administrator and applied to an organization. (B-17100, 4/17/2023; B-17040, 5/15/2023)
- Reports No Longer Automatically Retrieve Data - Per customer request, the Reports page will no longer automatically retrieve results for the last report run when navigating back to it from another page in nVoq.Administrator, after changing the organization level in the Organization menu, or after signing out and signing back in. Instead the last report and filter settings used remains selected, but the page displays a message that says, "To view a report, set filters and click refresh button above." (B-17087, 4/17/2023)
- Show Inactive & Show Deleted Checkbox Swap on Total Usage Summary Report - The "Show Inactive" and "Show Deleted" checkboxes have swapped places on the Total Usage Summary report in the 18.1.0 version of nVoq.Administrator. The filters work the same, they've just switched places, and are now in the same place as they are on the Total Usage Detail report. (B-17087, 4/17/2023)
- Vocabulary Applied to All Accounts Without Limitation - In previous releases vocabulary could only be applied to 10,000 accounts. If you were to add vocabulary at an organization level that included over 10,000 accounts, only 10,000 users will benefit from it. The work-around was to add vocabulary to a lower-level organization with fewer than 10,000 accounts in it. In the 18.1.0 release vocabulary can be added at any organization level regardless of the number of accounts. (B-17030, 4/26/2023)
- Max Character Count Increased for Usernames - Due to the need for customers to be able to use longer email addresses for usernames, the maximum character count for account usernames has been increased from 45 to 100. (This does not apply to system-level accounts, which still have a max character count of 45.) (B-17040, 5/15/2023)
- Faster Interactions with Review & Correct List View - As part of our ongoing work to improve the Review & Correct page, changes were made to the speed of interactions with the list view. Navigating between pages of the list view, changing the number of items displayed per page, and sorting on columns should now be a bit faster because it will no longer query the database for the total number of items. The database will still be queried for this information when the count is needed. (B-17238, 6/13/2023)
- Improved Speed, Reduced Errors When Retrieving Data on Review & Correct - As part of our ongoing work to improve the Review & Correct page, the speed of retrieving data from the system has increased to minimize the number of errors produced when doing so. All data on the page is now retrieved with a new query (except for the Look for Word filter which still uses the original method of gathering data). Keep in mind that it is still possible to encounter these errors when the queries are run against extremely large data sets. As a result of these changes dictations on the Review & Correct page are now associated with the group to which the user belonged at the time of the dictation submittal. So if a user is moved to a different group, you would need to make sure you select a parent of all groups to which the user belonged during the selected date range to see all of the user's dictations. If the user is moved to a different division, you would need to select a company organization that includes both divisions (or select the tenant to see everything). If the user's original organization (that does not include the new organization) is selected in the organization menu, the user's dictations done while in that organization will be in the Review & Correct list view, but the user will not be listed in the Account menu. All dictations submitted prior to the 18.1.0/18.1.1 deployment on your system are all found under the user's group at the time of deployment. Note that for reports all of the user's dictations are listed under their current group/organization, so is different than how this works in Review & Correct. (B-17189, 6/16/2023)
Bug Fixes in nVoq.Administrator
- Fix for Disabling an Organization Does Not Disable Accounts - In the 18.0.0 release of nVoq.Administrator, disabling an organization at any level does not automatically disable the accounts in that organization. Accounts in the disabled organization can still log in and use dictation and/or shortcuts, and they still have active billing subscriptions. If you need to disable accounts in a disabled organization: 1) Select the disabled organization from the Organization menu. 2) Go to the Accounts page and select all accounts 3) In the blue toolbar select the actions (More) icon and then select "Disable Accounts". When you disable an organization in the 18.1.0 version of nVoq.Administrator all of the accounts in that organization will automatically be disabled too. (D-13211, 3/29/2023)
- Fix for Review & Correct Dictation Audio Does Not Match Transcript - In the 18.0.0 version of nVoq.Administrator, the Detail Review & Correct page will sometimes associate one dictation with the recording from another one, so that the transcript does not match the recording. This can happen especially with long recordings. If using Next and Previous buttons, the dictation recording may match the previous dictation viewed. This has been fixed in 18.1.0. (D-13236, 4/17/2023)
- Fix for Wrong Error Displayed in R&C for Long Silence - If your dictation recording includes a specific length of silence, the dictation server will automatically stop processing the dictation and the nVoq client will stop the recording and display an error message such as "Low audio detected. Dictation stopped due to long period of silence." (from Voice) or "Long silence detected." (from Mobile Voice). When this happens, Review & Correct (R&C) is supposed to display an error for that dictation that says, "Stopped dictation due to silence exceeding [#] seconds." However in the 18.0.0 release these dictations appeared in R&C with an "Unexpected Termination" error instead. This has been fixed. In the 18.1.0 release these dictations will once again appear in R&C with the "Long silence detected" error. (D-13183, 5/5/2023)
- Fix for Rejecting a Dictation in R&C Clears External ID - In the previous release, the External ID field on the Detail Review & Correct page is cleared if you reject a dictation using the "Poor Quality" button. This has been fixed. In 18.1.0 when you click the Poor Quality button correction statistics associated with the dictation (if any) are removed, the associated accuracy score (if there is one) is removed from the summary table, and text that may have been entered in the Corrected Text field is removed, but text entered in the External ID field remains. (D-13276, 5/26/2023)
- Fix for Shortcuts Created with API Can Produce "Grammar" Error in Review & Correct - Prior to the 18.1.0 release the API to create a shortcut was not checking to make sure a shortcut name was valid, which could result in shortcuts that produced a "Grammar Compilation Failure" (or "Grammar Load Failure") error in Review & Correct. This error indicates that there is a shortcut containing forbidden characters in a user's account. An example of a shortcut that could cause this error is a shortcut with a name that has a space next to a hyphen (e.g. Oral- Pediatrics). The work-around is to edit the problem shortcut to remove the space next to the hyphen and save it. This type of issue is no longer allowed when creating shortcuts using our API. (D-13281, 6/12/2023)
- Fix for Account/Organization Delete Takes a Long Time, Results in Error - Organizations or accounts that contained unused shortcuts could take a long time to delete from the system, and they could also produce an error message such as, "Could not delete XYZ Company" when attempting to do so. This has been fixed. (D-13137, 6/12/2023)
- Fix for Duplicate Client Group Assignments for Accounts - In the current release there is an issue which can cause users to be assigned to more than one Client Group or duplicate entries for one Client Group assignment. The Accounts page shows the user being assigned to one Client Group, but our internal logging shows a different Client Group or more than one for the user. This creates duplicate transactions on the Review & Correct page, listing the same dictation for each Client Group, and also causes an error to occur in the dictation client when trying to use shortcuts. This issue, likely caused by changing a user's assigned Client Group multiple times, has been fixed. A migration script will also fix existing accounts that have this issue. (D-13279, 6/21/2023)
- Fix for Note Assist Usage Report Timing Out When Retrieving Data for One Day - The Note Assist Usage Report often times out with an error when attempting to retrieve a large amount of data. For larger tenants, this can mean that the report times out when trying to pull even one day of data. Improvements have been made in the database allowing reports that take up to 500 seconds to retrieve data. This means that a larger tenant should now be able to retrieve data for up to a week. The report will still time out when query exceeds 500 seconds, for example this may occur if running for a month's worth of data on a larger tenant. This change was made in the database on 6/23/2023 and is available on the Healthcare system now. (D-13304, 6/23/2023)
nVoq.APIs
There may be changes listed here that are not yet available on the Test system (https://test.nvoq.com/apidoc). To see when the latest updates were deployed, visit Test.nvoq.com Platform Upgrade Dates.
- Improvements to Wireless Microphone API for Dictation Key Press Event - An enhancement was made to the nVoq Wireless Microphone API to allow a more reactive user interface for the destination/desktop dictation push-to-talk (PTT) button. In previous releases, the PTT key-pressed event was sent at the same time as the
tObserverKey
event as part of the Process Dictation Key Pressed endpoint. This caused a delay from the time the dictation button was pressed on the Wireless Mic to the time the dictation was being recorded on the desktop application. To improve the speed of this process, a separate Process Transcription Observer Key event was created to provide atObserverKey
that can be sent separately from the PTT key-pressed event. ThetObserverKey
parameter on the Process Dictation Key Pressed endpoint has been deprecated, and a newcomm-protocol
parameter may be used instead. In order to make the newtObserverKey
parameter backwards compatible (to 18.0.0), a new element,splitObserverKey
, has been added to the Wireless Mic API endpoint to register a destination. When the value for this new element is "true" the iOS Wireless Microphone will perform separate key-pressed and observer key event requests. When false (or no value), the iOS Wireless Mic will wait for the transcription observer key from the dictation server and send the dictation/key-pressed event with thetObserverKey
. (B-17134, 4/20/2023; B-17221, 5/22/2023) - Dictation Context for WebSocket Observer - A new
snsContext
parameter has been added to the STARTDICTATION method for a WebSocket Observer Connection. This optional parameter may be used to provide context of the text next to dictation text to identify whether the first word in the dictation should be capitalized or not. (B-17172, 4/24/2023) - wMicForceHttp Property for iOS Wireless Mic Now Resets on Sign Out - In the 18.0.0 release a new tenant-level property (
wMicForceHttp
) was created to allow you to force the iOS Wireless Microphone to use HTTP for dictation when that is necessary for your client. When testing WebSocket and HTTP dictations it was discovered that this property did not reset when logging in with a different user account that has the property disabled. This has been fixed. In 18.1.0, thewMicForceHttp
property will reset when the user signs out of the iOS Wireless Microphone. No updates have been made to API documentation.(D-13254, 5/8/2023) - Fix for Mid-Dictation Commands Not Working Well with Spaces/New Line - In the previous release mid-dictation commands are adding a space after the command when a punctuation character is spoken after the command. (For example the dictation "medications [COMMAND] colon Avelox 400 mg" would return "Medications : Avelox 400 mg") This has been fixed; the dictation engine will now remove the extra space. (For example, the above dictation will now return "Medications: Avelox 400mg") This also fixes an issue in which the "new line" built-in substitution is not recognized after a mid-dictation command, and an issue in which a space is added to the incorrect text segment after a mid-dictation command if there is a pause after the command. No updates have been made to API documentation. (D-13207, 5/10/2023; D-13245, 5/10/2023)
- Max Character Count Increased for Usernames - Due to the need for customers to be able to use longer email addresses for usernames, the maximum character count for account usernames has been increased from 45 to 100. Attempting to update a username longer than 100 characters using the Update Account Username endpoint now returns an error message that says, "Username cannot be longer than 100 characters." No updates have been made to API documentation. (B-17040, 5/15/2023)
- Fix for Endpoint to Add Properties to an Existing Transaction - The endpoint used to add properties to an existing transaction responds with a 500 error if there are already properties associated with a transaction. This has been fixed. In the 18.1.0 release the endpoint will check to see if there are any properties. If not, they are created and added to the transaction. If there are properties, the endpoint will add additional properties to the transaction. (D-13269, 5/18/2023)
- Fix for Shortcuts Can be Created with Invalid Name Using API - Prior to the 18.1.0 release the API to create a shortcut was not checking to make sure a shortcut name was valid, which could result in shortcuts that produced an error in Review & Correct. The error, "Grammar Compilation Failure" (or "Grammar Load Failure") indicates that there is a shortcut containing forbidden characters in a user's account. An example of a shortcut that could cause this error is a shortcut with a name that has a space next to a hyphen (e.g. Oral- Pediatrics). The work-around is to edit the problem shortcut to remove the space next to the hyphen and save it. This type of issue is no longer allowed when creating shortcuts using our API. No change was made to documentation. (D-13281, 6/12/2023)
- New Parameter Provides Optional Count of Transactions - As part of our work to speed up interactions with the Review & Correct page, a new parameter (
includeCount
) has been added to the API to retrieve transactions. This parameter when set to "true" will return the total count of transactions as part of the response header. When the parameter is "false" the count is not returned and there is no query against the database to retrieve it. (B-17238, 6/13/2023) - Updates to Transactions APIs to Improve Speed - As part of our efforts to improve the speed of retrieving data on the Review & Correct page, modifications were made to some of the transactions API calls to change the way data is gathered. Transaction data is now saved on a new table and retrieved with a new query, except for the Look for Word filter (which still uses the original method of gathering data). API documentation was updated for the API to retrieve transactions to better explain that the
lookForWord
parameter can only be used to search for words in dictations. (B-17189, 6/16/2023) - Mobile Voice Configuration to Automatically Run Note Assist Audit Review - Mobile Voice can be configured to automatically run the selected Note Assist audit when dictation in the Note Assist window is stopped. This allows users to immediately see if their note includes all required categories, or if they are still missing some. A new property,
nVoqMobileVoiceNoteAssistRunAgainOnAction
can be set to "true" to enable this for your tenant. The default is false in the Mobile Voice client when the property is not defined. (D-13303, 6/23/2023, B-17106, 4/26/2023) - Mobile Voice Account Shortcuts and Auto-Run Note Assist Audit Properties Automatically Picked Up by Mobile Voice - In 18.0.0 we added the ability to configure Mobile Voice to allow users to add their own account shortcuts in Mobile Voice, and in this release we added the ability to configure Mobile Voice to automatically re-run the selected Note Assist audit when a dictation on the Note Assist screen is stopped. These functionalities are controlled by tenant level properties, both off by default. Until now these changes, once configured for the tenant, would only be picked up by end users if they signed out and signed back in to Mobile Voice. Since most users do not sign out of Mobile Voice very often, these properties (
nVoqMobileVoiceEnableUserShortcuts
andnVoqMobileVoiceNoteAssistRunAgainOnAction
) have been added to the list of properties that are automatically updated in Mobile Voice every 30 minutes. (D-13302, 6/23/2023)