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Acute care question - sm

Posted: Apr 29, 2013

I've been in transcription since 1998, doing clinic work for about 13 of those, then moving to acute care consisting of H&P, consults, and discharge summaries....but not op notes. I see so many jobs for acute care work, but they only want people who've done all four. My question is, how do you go about learning to do op notes in order to obtain one of those jobs? I've been tempted to fib and say I have experience just to get the job and then figured maybe I could learn on the job since in this industry we are always learning on the job anyway. Any time I've taken on a new specialty, there have always been new terms, procedures, medications, etc. Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Op notes - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
I DESPISE op notes, but you have some of those people who love them. In most of my career doing this, I was lucky enough not to have to do many op notes. One company that I worked for routed the ops to a specific group of TALENTED MTs, in my opinion, and I have done lots of clinic work too.

When I got a different acute care job, I told the recruiter that op notes were my LEAST experienced area, but was still hired. I didn't mind one here or there, but I spent an awful lot of time looking them up. I know that sometimes though I would get a whole day of op notes and I would want to cry! There are sample notes you can look at, to guide you, but for ME, those don't help.

For ME, I was a nurse before this and for part of my career I worked in an endoscopy study center and actually PERFORMED colonoscopies, EGDs, etc., but I can't type one to save my life! I have NO understanding of typing those notes. When I hear someone saying they love OP reports, I think that person is crazy.

You may catch on better than me, not sure what my problem is, LOL.

Loved op notes! Best money of my life was made then. Not any - more. No surgery centers hiring. Sad... NM

[ In Reply To ..]
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Crazy person here, love OP notes. - anon

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I think they are way easier. They are straight forward with no background info in them.

So you need to learn the names of some equipment, big deal, that is what Google is for.

I would rather do op notes all day than anything else.

Me too - GrateMT

[ In Reply To ..]
I too love Op notes. Was fortunate to have learned to do them when I worked at a hospital and some of the other MT's were very helpful. I agree they are straightforward and sometimes the dictators just rattle off the same things each time, and SR gets really familiar with them and actually does a great job with them. One can rack up a whole lot of lines doing these. My husband was a surg-tech, and when he would come home from work I would brag to him how I had been "doing C-sections all day" or lap chole's or appendectomies, or whatever. It was our standing joke.

I would think it would be easy to pull up past reports by the dictators and find past reports of the same type to help you learn as you go along. Depends on your account and platform, I suppose.

Op notes are easier if you are good with anatomy - Maggie May

[ In Reply To ..]
If you are very familiar with human anatomy and know all about the area being operated on, then you will have a better understanding of what is being dictated, especially with ESLs or other difficult dictators. Plus there are a lot of surgeries that are pretty much done the same way regardless of which surgeon, like C-sections.

google? - mtr

[ In Reply To ..]
IMO that is what reference books and reference electronic books are for!!

Acute care/OP notes - Cheela

[ In Reply To ..]
I worked for Mayo Clinic for 6 years and did no OP reports until I got hired at acute care 12 years ago. Thankfully the transcriptionists there had a sample book of the OP reports they generally did. However, if you're going to be getting OP notes from all over the place and not confined to one hospital, it could be quite a bit harder catching on. I only had one surgeon with a thick Thai accent to overcome. The surgical instruments and some of the body parts were rather new to me, but back then the hospital didn't allow us to access the Internet!!!??! If you have the Internet, it's usually pretty easy to find the names of instruments, techniques, typical OP reports, etc. If you get paid more for doing acute care, it'd be worth the chance I think.

dont be dishonest - mtr

[ In Reply To ..]
about it approach your job or prospective job and let them know you do not have this experience but you have the other 3 and that you would like to learn ops. I am sure that you can at least get a trial shot at it if you have been an MT for that long. good luck!!!

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