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My answers too - MargaritaMama

Posted: Nov 30th, 2016 - 1:30 am In Reply to: Interview with a Medical Transcripionist - Ashley

I fell into the field after majoring in music but didn't continue with it (1970s-80s). I was able to type and was good at English and liked office work, so I took a secretarial job, which happened to be in a hospital. I liked being part of a hospital, then later met their former MT supervisor. She had begun doing the hospital's overload at her home, starting up her own business, so she hired me and trained and mentored me to do some simple reports, and then I just kept going, learning more and more.

I love to learn new things every day and find medicine really fascinating, but the academics of it, not the hands-on. I get to use all my best skills (good spelling and grammar, I like "words" and reading, fast typist, eye for detail, like to play detective and do research, like to think I make a difference in contributing to an accurate chart and producing a good report, can sit and focus for a long time on one thing). Also I love it because I work acute care (hospitals/teaching hospitals), so the narratives are longer and more interesting - doctors from a wide variety of medical specialties are dictating. But if I were typing more rote reports, I'd go nuts with boredom and would have quit by now, for sure!

Least favorite things: My hospital closed our office and outsourced elsewhere, which was the trend. So to continue MT, I had to work at home. I had liked having coworkers and being part of the outside world, not cooped up all by myself with almost no communication from my company except the voice recordings. I liken it to being alone in outer space. Also at the hospital I had regular hourly pay and decent benefits. Now am paid by production, as I believe we all are who work at home, and the pay is extremely poor. I feel it's not much different at most other MT companies, otherwise I'd have applied elsewhere. Also, on this forum, oftentimes when I see an MT company that seems to be a better place to work and pays a little more, next thing I know they're being taken over by a larger company or otherwise going out of business, so it just keeps getting worse. I believe the offshoring has mostly been responsible for dropping our pay, a way for companies to offer medical facilities cheap transcription, so our pay has been dragged down by that. I make literally half of what I used to, which is an insult, considering it's a job that requires a lot of training and knowledge (word recognition and understanding what you're typing), speed, and extreme accuracy. You'd think I'd quit, and I often want to, but then I can't imagine a job I'd like anywhere near as well as this one. I've never been so torn up by anything, I've been paralyzed thinking about it for a long time. I should leave but I don't.

I work at home for the past 8 years but was working at hospitals for over 20 years.

Advice: I'd tell them MT has become a dead-end job now, and not to bother. Some people make minimum wage. I make more, but it depends on the doctors I get and the quality of Speech Recognition, but it's rotten pay for this job. Don't waste thousands of dollars on tuition for MT school, which I'm certain is mandatory to be hired anywhere -- IF you can get hired without experience. Many places will not.

How long did it take me to get to this level? Years and years, since there are always new medical advances, new drugs, new surgical equipment, new treatments, everything changes and updates constantly. It's really exciting to me.

I work a full shift 4 days a week.

Cuyahoga, I certainly recognize that county, used to live there!

Hope your school project turns out well.

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