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I'm cannot afford to quit work as a MT and go to school for coding/billing. s/m - mt2long

Posted: Aug 22, 2012

I will have to continue to work full-time while taking classes. Which online schools are accredited? And is there a big difference in getting a job/pay for having diploma or certificate? I'm in Florida and there are a lot of schools advertised. I want a good school, not a scam program. Thank you.

Some of the worst are accredited. That just means they take federal financial aid - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
There have been a lot of articles and investigations about accredited schools for the last couple of years. The students are ending up with huge amounts of student loan debt and coming out with such poor educations that they can't get a job to help pay back the loans. Don't make that your criteria for choosing a school.

What you want to know with coding education is whether the school's graduates can pass credentials tests, especially the CCS, but also the CPC. You'll find quite a few that prepare students to pass the CPC, but not very many that teach to the level of the CCS. Andrews does. I'm not familiar with any others, but maybe some of their students and graduates will add to the conversation.

Good luck with your decision!

Schools that "advertise" like that are diploma mills. - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
Those schools that "advertise" all over the place are diploma mills. They are the ones you want to avoid. Yes, they ARE all over Florida. In the 40 miles I drove yesterday, I counted 4 billboards for them and saw 6 office buildings that had one in it. If I were to drive in the opposite direction, I would see another 10.

One thing you said was that you will have to continue to work full-time while taking classes, so you were looking for an online school. The idea that students do not work and attend school full-time -- in other words, they go to school all day or at night in person -- is no longer applicable to most college settings.

The majority of health information technology programs, which are the ones that contain coding classes or programs, are based in physical buildings, but their classes are going to be online. They will use commercial courseware like Angel or Blackboard to host online classes in every subject you take. The class itself will consist of an online teaching module that matches the textbook. The publisher creates the online material that matches the book, the PowerPoints, exercises, and exams. Instead of doing written assignments to hand in, you will do them online in the software or do them on your computer and upload them to the courseware. Your class "interaction" will be gauged by participation in chat room discussions. Say, every week you will have to post an answer to a question posted on the chatroom board and post a response to another student's question. At some schools, you have to attend an online discussion session once or twice weekly. If the instructor offers lectures, they may be just uploaded PowerPoints or written scripts.

At some schools they may provide the recording of the lecture, as well. Very few will provide a transcript of that lecture, so you will end up transcribing a few hours of that every week, or at least listening and taking notes. Two schools I attended would test incredibly trivial, irrelevant detail from those lectures to ensure that you did listen to them instead of just reading the PowerPoint. Stuff like "in the example given on the third slide of lecture 2 . . ."

What I'm trying to tell you is that you are not going to get an instructor in a class even if you DO attend a local college. What you are likely to get is a lot of complicated busy-work intended to replace sitting in a classroom for a semester.

To answer your question about job/pay differences for diplomas or certificates, I'll start by saying the big difference you need to worry about is between becoming employable and not becoming employable. Regardless of what program you take, you need a CPC certification at a minimum and preferably the CCS, as well.

That is about the only way to overcome your lack of experience when you go job-hunting. It is not foolproof, either. You still have to be appealing in a "professional" way to an employer.

What is the difference between a diploma and a certificate? It isn't clear what you mean by that. If you mean a diploma from a 2-year college HIT program and a certificate from a shorter coding program, there isn't any. It makes no difference how you learn coding. The only thing that matters is getting a CPC and CCS. That being said, you need to look closely at the program you are considering, because I do not think there are any HIT programs or college coding programs goes beyond the CCA credential. They all buy into the belief that you need 3 years of working experience to learn enough to pass the CCS. Unfortunately, employers won't want to hire you without the CCS.

Accreditation can mean several things. A college can be regionally accredited (typically non-profit, "traditional" universities like Duke, Harvard, UMiami, and Western Governors are regionally accredited) or accredited by an organization specifically set up to accredit colleges that cannot get accredited by regional organizations (for-profit diploma mills, tech and business colleges owned locally or by giant corporations). The big difference is that regionally accredited colleges will not accept credit from the others and employers might have an aversion to hiring you if you attended a diploma mill or tech college.

There is also accreditation by CAHIIM. They accredit HIT and HIA programs. You cannot sit for the RHIT or RHIA exams unless you have completed a program that is accredited by CAHIIM. The fact that a school is accredited by CAHIIM does not mean it is not a diploma mill, because CAHIIM accredits some for-profits and known diploma mills. They also "approve" primarily college coding programs, but there is no requirement to attend one of them in order to sit for credentialing exams--it is mostly a marketing tool.

The AAPC has coding courses itself and also certifies instructors who teach the course locally and sometimes online. Those courses cover ONLY outpatient coding. Graduates usually can pass the CPC exam because the courses are tailored for that. This will enable you to get a job doing physician office coding, mostly. That's an ok start to begin with IF there are a lot of jobs in your local market. The best way to find out is to attend meetings of your AAPC chapter and network with members. You'll have to find them anyway to take the CPC exam.

For other courses, Andrews teaches to both the CPC and CCS exams, apparently teaching outpatient and inpatient coding completely separately. Their students have been having success in the certification arena. They are definitely not a scam. They have an advantage in that they are not totally online. They still use books and have well-qualified instructors. They offer a good payment plan and, I think, still participate in some other programs, to offset the fact that they do not participate in the student loan program.

Cost always comes up in discussions like this. I can tell you that the diploma mills will cost the most, sometimes leaving students with $39 in debt for just a coding program. They emphasize loan programs that are devastating in the long run, especially if you are unable to get a job. Other programs all work out to about the same amount, even though it might not seem so. Some make it appear that they cost less by offering less material or "homemade" material, or by offering a price for a too-short-to-complete time frame and charging extra for the extensions they know you will need, or by charging extra if you want books and course materials (especially if you cannot get them elsewhere). Some do it by not having instructors at all, or by offering a team of unknown "experts" who may help you with a limited number of questions. (One course allows students something like an hour of instructor time, charging extra for additional.)

In comparison, another program may seem to be more expensive, but may include all course materials, reputable industry-standard references and textbooks, unlimited time to completion and instructor support, a reputation for working with students until they succeed in passing certification exams, and may offer twice as much instruction, including an actual course devoted to just inpatient coding. On a cost-benefit basis, their tuition works out to be a real bargain, although at first glance it deters students who are looking for something cheap.

I would suggest you read a few months' worth of postings on this board to get an idea about schools.

Thank you !! - mt2long

[ In Reply To ..]
.

I currently work full time and am going to school - A student

[ In Reply To ..]
I just wanted to tell you, while it is difficult to work full time and go to school for coding, it can be done. It's definitely NOT easy. I usually study 2 hours in the afternoon when my little one is napping and then on my days off, I usually put in about 5 hours at night after my kids go to bed. Take your time and do your research on what school would be the best fit. I currently go to Andrews and it's not a scam school, but it just depends on if you need financial aid and such. Good luck to you :)

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