Medical Transcription Training - Start Your New Career!

To transcribe means to put in written form.

"Medical Transcriptionists use headsets and transcribing machines to listen to recordings by physicians and other healthcare professionals. These workers transcribe a variety of medical reports about emergency room visits, diagnostic imaging studies, operations, chart reviews, and final summaries. To understand and accurately transcribe dictated reports into a format that is clear and comprehensible for the reader, the medical transcriptionist must understand the language of medicine, anatomy and physiology, diagnostic procedures, and treatment. They also must be able to translate medical jargon and abbreviations into their expanded forms. After reviewing and editing for grammar and clarity, the medical transcriptionist transcribes the dictated reports and returns them in either printed or electronic form to the dictator for review and signature, or correction. These reports eventually become a part of the patient's permanent file."

Source: 2008 Occupational Outlook Handbook

"It's a great job. You can work part-time or full time. My editor for many years worked part-time as a transcriptionist because she wanted to stay home with her young children and it was a good fit for her. You start at $30,000 a year and you can either work for a major organization and work independently and they're hiring 18,000 a year."
- Dennis Damp on CNN's Your Money
November 30, 2008

When the patient visits a doctor, the doctor spends time with the patient discussing his medical problems, including past history and/or problems. After the patient leaves the office, the doctor uses a voice-recording device to record the information about the patient encounter.

It is very important to have a properly formatted, edited, and reviewed medical transcription document. If a medical transcriptionist accidentally typed a wrong medication or the wrong diagnosis, the patient could be at risk if the doctor (or his designee) did not review the document for accuracy. Both the Doctor and the medical transcriptionist play an important role to make sure the transcribed dictation is correct and accurate.

It is imperative and a large part of the job of the Transcriptionist to look up the correct spelling of complex medical terms, medications, obvious dosage or dictation errors, and when in doubt should "flag" a report. A "flag" on a report requires the dictator to fill in a blank on a finished report, which has been returned to him, before it is considered complete. Transcriptionists are never, ever permitted to guess, or 'just put in anything' in a report transcription. Furthermore, medicine is constantly changing. New equipment, new medical devices, and new medications come on the market on a daily basis, and the Medical Transcriptionist needs to be creative and to tenaciously research (quickly) to find these new words. An MT needs to have access to, or keep on hand, an up-to-date library to quickly facilitate the insertion of a correctly spelled device, procedure, or medication dictated.

Article source -Wikipedia

Medical Transcriptionists are employed in comfortable settings, such as hospitals, physicians' offices, transcription service offices, clinics, laboratories, medical libraries, government medical facilities, or their own homes. Many medical transcriptionists telecommute from home-based offices.

Hospitals, Doctor's Clinics, and Transcription companies calculate the medical transcription salary in a variety of different ways. A typical transcription job is a document 1-2 pages in length. Some companies pay by completed document or by the hour, but hourly jobs are typically in-office jobs where MTs are overseen by an office manager.

Independent contractors earn more than transcriptionists who work for others, but independent contractors have higher expenses than their corporate counterparts, receive no benefits, and may face higher risk of termination than employed transcriptionists.

The most common medical transcription salary is paid "per line" of transcription. This can range from $.06 Cents/line to $.12 Cent/line depending on the experience level of the MT, the type of job, and the turn-around time required by the physician. For example, radiology jobs typically have a 4 hour turn-around requirement, but average turn-around requirements are usually in the 24 to 48 hour range.

The typical medical transcription salary had median earnings per hour of $15.020 in May 2007. The middle 50% made between $12.73 and $17.95. The lowest 10% made less than $10.65, and the highest 10% made more than $21.19.

Entry-level MTs can make anywhere from $22,160 to $44,070 on a full-time basis. Experienced MT's can earn up to $60,000 annually by securing accounts and having other MTs working under them. This is above average for home-based businesses. Sixty percent of MTs have work from home jobs, while 40% are in an office atmosphere.

Employment of MTs is expected to grow 14% from 2006 to 2016. This growth rate is higher than other average occupations. An increasing older population will initiate higher demands for MT services. Higher age groups are receiving proportionately larger numbers of treatments, medical tests, and procedures requiring documentation. The continuous requirement for electronic documents being shared without difficulty among providers, regulators, 3rd party payers, consumers, and medical information systems, will increase the demand for transcription services.

Consequently, the medical transcription salary will increase, drawing more workers in the talent pool. An increased number of medical transcriptionists are going to be required to revise patients' records, revise documents from speech recognition technologies, and recognize differences in medical transcription reports.
Article source - US Department of Labor - Bureau of Labor Statistics

Today, there is a shortage of over 300,000 qualified Medical Transcriptionists worldwide according to the AHDI (Association for Healthcare Documentation Integrity).

Employers prefer to hire transcriptionists who have completed postsecondary training in medical transcription offered by many vocational schools, community colleges, and distance-learning programs.

Programs that include coursework in anatomy, medical terminology, legal issues relating to health care documentation, and English grammar and punctuation are highly recommended, but not always required. Many of these programs include supervised on-the-job experience. Some transcriptionists, especially those already familiar with medical terminology from previous experience as a nurse or medical secretary, become proficient through refresher courses and training.

Formal accreditation is not required for medical transcription programs.

Article source: U.S. Dept. of Labor

Most experience needed to perform well as an MT is learned on-the-job and in the real world. However, you gain more initial comprehensive knowledge with a University. There are two schools of thought when choosing medical transcription classes. It really depends if you want to learn more of the basics before you begin employment or if you want practical MT training so you can begin working quicker.

Medical Transcriptionist Schools should be compared against each individual person's goals and objectives. Keep in mind, MTs get paid primarily on accuracy and productivity and real experience is the only real way to improve these necessary skills.

The VLC School of Medical Transcription Training

VLC employs four of the best Transcriptionist instructors who review, mark both tests and exams as well as mentor, to make your computer a great alternative to a community college or university classroom, at a fraction of the cost.

VLC offers an Internship program to all VLC Medical Transcription students in our Medical Transcription courses.

When you have completed all required transcription assignments with an average grade of 90% or better, and have successfully completed the medical transcription final examination, you will be entered into a 6 week internship. You will be paid between 2 and 6 cents per line to transcribe medical reports for a national Medical Transcription company. Upon successful completion of the internship and your Medical Transcription course, you will be offered a position with this company.

Blackstone Career Institute

Blackstone Career Institute has continuously provided career training since 1890, with the distinction of being one of the oldest distance education training schools in the country.

Blackstone is privately licensed by the Pennsylvania Department of Education and accredited by the Accrediting Commission of the Distance Education and Training Council, Washington, D.C. These regulations are your assurance that Blackstone offers first-rate quality programs and instruction.

They are also members of the Better Business Bureau.

Future MT

Future MT's home study course is the most comprehensive medical transcriptionist course training system available in a single package. This course is designed for students with no prior experience as well as those looking for refresher training.

Future MT offers graduates access to resources through their Job Assistance Department; including medical transcription links, employment tips, resume writing techniques and other valuable tools.

Future MT also has a money-back guarantee and is a member of the Better Business Bureau.

Penn Foster Career School

Train to be a Medical Transcriptionist with the world's leader in at-home education. Penn Foster training methods have helped men and women to better jobs and better lives for over a century.

Penn Foster Career School is accredited by the Middle States Commission on Secondary Schools for high school and vocational-technical programs, and by the Accrediting Commission of the Distance Education and Training Council (DETC). Penn Foster Career School is affiliated with DANTES, which qualifies U.S. military personnel for tuition reimbursement. Many Penn Foster programs are approved for U.S. Armed Forces veterans training benefits.

Penn Foster Career School offers affordable, all-inclusive pricing-among the lowest of all career schools-and 0% interest financing and customized payment plans.

Blackstone Information Packet
Your future is in your hands - choose career training medical transcriptionist, or medical biller/coder, and start your new career in 2 years or less! Visit Blackstone Career Institute for a free information packet.

Not sure if Medical Transcription is for you? The Virtual Learning Center (VLC) offers a FREE online introduction course to help you decide if this career is for you!

~Complete this course in less than 60 minutes
~Try some free Medical Terminology
~Learn about medical anatomy free
~Find out how much medical transcriptionist can earn
~Learn what a medical transcriptionist job entails

CLICK HERE for your no obligation, no strings attached, FREE Medical Transcription Course!

eCampus has an excellent selection of textbooks on Medical Transcription

The AHDI awards two voluntary designations, the Registered Medical Transcriptionist (RMT) and the Certified Medical Transcriptionist (CMT). Medical transcriptionists who are recent graduates of medical transcription educational programs, or have fewer than 2 years experience in acute care, may become a registered RMT. The RMT credential is awarded upon successfully passing the AHDI level 1 registered medical transcription exam. The CMT designation requires at least 2 years of acute care experience working in multiple specialty surgery areas using different format, report, and dictation types. Candidates also must earn a passing score on a certification examination. Because medicine is constantly evolving, medical transcriptionists are encouraged to update their skills regularly. RMTs and CMTs must earn continuing education credits every 3 years to be recertified. As in many other fields, certification is recognized as a sign of competence.

Ezilon India - India Web Directory and Search Engine