A method of creating a surgical operative note during a specific surgical procedure on a patient. The method includes creating surgical checklists for a plurality of surgical procedures before initiation of the surgical procedure, creating an index of image specific annotations for the specific surgical procedure before initiation of the surgical procedure, obtaining an electronic template, inserting one of the surgical checklists into the template associated with the specific surgical procedure on the patient, obtaining an image of the patient, inserting the image of the patient into the electronic template, using a voice command to associate at least one of the image specific annotations with the image of the patient in the electronic template, and inserting the at least one of the image specific annotations into the electronic template adjacent the image.