I just came off a webinar on AI-assisted clinic letter drafting in Word, and it sounds like several hospitals are piloting it this quarter. I’m updating our training to focus on stronger templates, precise prompts, and a 10-minute audit-and-sign-off before sending — has anyone built macros or checklists that help under time pressure? Reminder: anything that sounds like a clinical concern should go to the clinician, and urgent issues belong with a licensed professional.
I use a Word AutoText trigger ‘;audit’ to drop a one‑screen checklist — ‘identifiers, diagnosis, actions, copy list, dates, AI inserts verified’ — so the 10‑minute review stays consistent; tiny caveat: keep it short or people skip it. Want the snippet?
, for the 10‑minute audit I mapped Alt+0 to a quick “pre‑send” macro in Word that scans for [brackets]/?/‘AI:’ and opens the Navigation pane with all hits, then stamps the header with patient ID + today’s date so I can tick and sign. It’s already caught two placeholders I’d have missed under time pressure. @eroberts04 your AutoText is neat — has anyone tried content controls that turn red until filled as a no‑macro fallback?
Small thing that saves me: in Word I set AutoCorrect so typing “XX” turns red and highlighted, then I run File > Info > Inspect Document to strip comments/track changes before sign‑off — , the hidden bits have bitten us before. @marcohill61 your Nav pane scan is smart; have you added a quick check for future-dated appointments to catch anything beyond today?
Instead of another checklist, I baked identifiers into the template with content controls mapped to custom properties, so patient name/NHS no./clinic date auto‑repeat in header, body and copy list — makes the ‘audit-and-sign-off’ faster because one fix updates everywhere. If you’re in Word, this walkthrough helps: Create a form in Word that users can complete or print - Microsoft Support. Small caveat: lock too much and the AI writes around it, so I leave findings/plan free while the identifiers/diagnosis/date fields stay controlled.