More than half of MTs still work in a hospital or doctor's office.
If you are interested in the medical field and telecommuting, you may have considered a career in medical transcription. Although most medical transcriptionists (MTs) still work in hospitals, doctors' offices and other health care facilities, a growing number are working from their home offices. However, as a beginning transcriptionist, you may be required to work in your employer's office before transitioning into a telecommuting arrangement, according to the Association for Healthcare Documentation Integrity (AHDI). Although transcription is your primary duty as an MT, you likely will have other job responsibilities.
Transcription
Transcription involves listening to recordings and typing the content into a word processing program. Your equipment includes a computer, headset and a foot pedal for pausing recordings. As a medical transcriptionist, you listen to recordings from doctors and other health care professionals. Examples of some of the documents you create include medical histories, consultation notes, diagnostic imaging information, physical examination notes and medical referral letters. As an MT, it is your responsibility to create these documents using the correct format and proper spelling. For this reason, you must know medical terminology in order to understand the dictation. For example, doctors may use abbreviations that you will have to spell out in the final transcribed documents. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, some health care offices now use speech recognition software that creates drafts of the dictation. If your employer uses this technology, you will listen to the recordings while reading the draft, correcting any errors along the way.
Office Duties
If you work in a doctor's office, you may be assigned office or clerical duties in addition to medical transcribing. Some employers will expect you to complete tasks typically associated with front-office staff. These duties can include receiving incoming patients, scheduling appointments and answering phones. You also may handle incoming and outgoing mail, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Research and Teaching
After you become a highly experienced MT, your job responsibilities may change. The longer you work in this field, the more likely you are to be responsible for issues that go beyond simply transcribing recordings. You will examine health information documents to ensure the correct terminology and formatting has been used. This can require you to research health information issues independently. You also may transition into more of a teaching or training role as you become an experienced medical transcriptionist. This can involve supervising a team of transcriptionists in the office to ensure they are following proper procedures. You may be involved in training inexperienced MTs and guiding them through the process of creating accurate medical documents. According to the AHDI, once you reach this stage in your career, you may do very little medical transcribing yourself.
Tags: health care, Bureau Labor, Bureau Labor Statistics, doctor office, documents According, health information
