A community of 30,000 US Transcriptionist serving Medical Transcription Industry

How would you feel about organizing a strike? - SSE

Posted: Apr 18, 2010

So, I know that there are a lot of issues from all sides of the MT industry and that a lot of people are unhappy. I know that there are many happy MTs out there, but I think that those MTs may be newbies (and don't really know the difference of how it used to be to now) or are one the lucky few that work for some of the great companies out there, or possibly work in-house.

IMHO there should be NO reason to send our work out of the country, especially with delicate medical and other personal information. I also think VR is a waste of everyone's time and money and creates its own set of problems. There are many other problems as well that I may have forgot to mention here.

The truth is that EHR is coming into our world, but I do not see this as a bad thing. Perhaps we could figure out a way to let the physicians put in things how they do now, but they should continue to dictate and allow us MTs to be able to put reports right along in with the EHR records, and I know that most of the programs out there are capable of this. We should be able to work WITH the physicians to create more accurate and thorough records for ourselves.

We deserve higher pay than what we have now, and the biggest threat to that is outsourcing. We are making less money because a lot of our work is simply done by others now, and then we edit a lot of that! Why in the world are we doing editing for those who are taking our jobs?

So why don't we just STOP working for companies that outsource...I mean if we are all making so little how much would it hurt to stop for one week? I know that I have had a couple of positions with so little work available that I have actually received paychecks under $10. I could afford to lose that.

Could you imagine how much attention we could get for the cause if even just 100 MTs stopped doing all the editing coming out of India? That would create havoc for MTSOs, hospitals, doctors, clinics, etc. The healthcare industry makes its money in documentation, so if there were some problems getting reports back that were readable, and on time, billing would have issues as well. That has the potential to REALLY get some attention for us all. And get more to join the cause. They would soon be BEGGING for skilled MTs to come back. And couldn't you get behind the cause to get some companies to change their ways? If we all stuck together then we could bring back up the wages, and those companies that outsource so much of their work would have to either stick with that or go with some of those companies who do not outsource. And they are out there!

I think that if it was thought out well enough and organized by a few good MTs with some good ideas to get the word out, be it message board postings, online articles, or perhaps even a website with all the information that is easy to find...there are many possibilities. And couldn't you spread the word about that kind of information to fellow MTs? The biggest weakness we have is that we cannot see each other and we are isolated from each other, but it does not have to be that way.

I do not know if a union is a good idea or not for MTs, but if we look at history unions have accomplished some great things. We deserve the right to work for a respectable wage and not have to edit all the awful reports produced by VR and people who work in other countries. And while I don't think a union is what we want exactly, I do think that we all need to realize how much we need each other, and we need to stick together. We need to educate the newbies that 0.05 cpl is not a fair wage! We need to stand up for our right to do our job, as professionals, and not get treated like dirt. We deserve benefits that cannot be taken away when there is not work even provided to us to be able to meet some of the crazy requirements in order to earn them. I have worked as an MT for the last 4 years without being able to see the doctor myself because of health insurance, etc. and that is a little ridiculous to me.

I know that it is a big idea, but I believe that with the proper planning and approach it could be very powerful. Any thoughts, opinions, suggestions?

All that would accomplish - Ann

[ In Reply To ..]
would be to transfer the jobs of the MTs who refused to work to offshore MTs or to the thousands of other U.S. MTs currently looking for work.

It is highly unlikely that more than a comparative handfull of MTs would sign on to such a strike in any event. Their employers would simply fire them and hire someone else or send the work offshore.

Any effort that would be expended in a futile effort to organize and enforce a strike would probably be better directed toward studying the direction the industry is heading and devising ways to make it work for you or to acquire new or additional skills that will bring in the kind of income you want.

The only practical possibility for stabilizing MT jobs in the U.S. in the short term is legislation that requires that U.S. medical records be processed in the U.S. This will not be accomplished by a strike. Even if such legislation is eventually passed, it will not ensure that U.S. MT jobs will return to the glory days. It will likely simply mean that instead of our jobs being taken by offshore MTs, they will be replaced by various forms of technology.

The long-term prospects for MT as is used to be are very dim. The MTs who prosper in the future will be those who can make the new reality work for them.

Strike? - Anonymous

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I work on site for a great employer so I guess I am one of the lucky ones. If you threaten a strike, I guarantee that your company will replace you in a heartbeat. If you are willing to take that risk, be my guest. MTs need to get over thinking that we are indispensible; there used to be a shortage of us but that is no longer true. Trust me, no one will be begging us to come back, they'll offshore the work or find some newbies willing to work for less. I'm hoping to have a job after my employer converts to EHR, our providers have been given the choice of entering the info into templates themselves, using VR and doing their own editing or continuing to dictate, so we will still have a mix of styles. I am taking nothing for granted and am updating my skills and looking for non-MT jobs too. Why do you HAVE to be a medical transcriptionist? You can train for another job if you are unhappy and not making it, sometimes change can be a good thing.

Strikes don't really work - just ask the air traffic controllers from about 25

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Anyone remember the Air Traffic Controller strike during the Reagan Administration? He fooled them. Fired the lot of them.

A. There's no union. I for one would never join a union.
B. Too many people in this industry are actually happy at their jobs.
C. All a strike would do is bring more ILPs into the labor pool.

Some serious answers for you - sm

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First, it doesn't sound like you have any knowledge of what a strike really is, how it works, etc.

Well, I do. My family was a union family all my life. My father was high in the CWA union. Only 3 times was he ever out on a strike but I remember those times well. As I became an adult, we had many indepth discussions about unionization that I was not able to understand in my earlier years. We still, to this day, discuss this industry and how unionization and strikes are talked about.

Without a solid nationwide unionization of MTs, you have not a ghost of a chance of doing anything but being fired. Even with a union solidly behind you, with the VR and offshoring options that MTSOs have, you simply have zero leverage. MTSOs will do anything to stop it. Do not think that laws can prevent them from firing you for whatever cause -- they can simply fire at will, the same as you can quit at will.

A strike is NEVER the first nor foremost action by a union. It is the absolute last resort - after months and sometimes years of talks and negotiations break down or fail to improve. Such negotiations and coverage by labor unions are about BENEFITS and not solely or even largely focused on pay.

It would not be anything but completely and utterly impotent and result in nothing but loss of jobs for those who participate, possible loss of jobs for those who do participate as companies may well decide to simply outsource or force to VR or force to IC status.

If you cannot change and adapt with the industry, you should move on to another line of work.

You cannot turn back the hands of time. Technology is here - you cannot stop it. The politics of business are here - you cannot stop it.

At best, if Congress and the Senate institute laws governing offshoring of work, you might see a small impact. Maybe.

Excellent Message - Very Well Said! - Nodding my head in agreement.

[ In Reply To ..]
You have explained why a strike wouldn't work and you've done it with class. Thanks for your message, which was thoughtfully and intelligently written.

It would be a mistake and you are misinformed - on a couple of issues

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First, if people are unhappy with their jobs/career then it's time they look for other work, go back to school to study for a different career or whatever, but forming a strike is just a bad idea in the history of bad ideas.

There are many many MTs who are happy doing what they are doing. You are misinformed to speak that they are newbies, and don't know how things used to be. I don't consider 18 years a "newbie", nor does my co-worker of 12 years, my other of 14 year and my other of 8 years. Neither do others that I email regularly and have worked with in the past. To assume that if someone is happy in their job is a "newbie" then that's all it is...an assumption. The fact of the matter is times are changing, and as an MT I have to learn new systems and ways of working. If people didn't change we'd still be listening to cassette tapes and typing on an IBM Selectric. As with any career people need to adapt to new systems and methods of working. It's called progress.

There should not be any reason for anyone to send transcription jobs out of the country, and there are a lot of companies who don't. Another assumption on your part. But what your post will do is further the cause for employers to send work overseas if you think because you want things a certain way you are going to form a strike to get your way.

Higher pay would be nice, but have you not been paying attention to what is going on in the country. The economy is bad...and I mean really really bad. Unemployment is on the rise and companies are trying to cut back.

If you can afford to lose work, more power to you. I am a single income family. I, for one, cannot afford to be out of work. Second there is absolutely no reason for me to not work as I like my job, my supervisors, the work I do. I am happy in my job, I am treated very fairly and with respect (and no I don't make minimum wage - my wage is based on how fast I type and it's not minimum wage).

I think the only attention you are going to bring to yourselves is the attention that you are refusing to work when work needs to be done and your company or whoever you work for will give your work to someone else, but hey, go ahead because that means my company could pick up the accounts and I will have more work.

I think before you organize anything you really should get the facts. You need solid numbers and facts. You should also be prepared for the worst. You write as though every MT is unhappy and making minimum wage. I can tell you for a fact that is not the truth. If you want to go on your little strike by all means go ahead. If that's what floats your boat as they say. I and others will be more than happy to welcome any accounts you may have had into our typing pools. That isn't meant to be hurtful, that's just a fact of what is going to happen, and in the end you'll end up looking for a different career anyway.

It seems this conversation was had below when someone who wasn't happy with her job wanted all MTs to quit their jobs so they could all unite in her unhappiness.

Personally, everyone needs to figure out what it is they are going to be happy doing. Times are not like they were 20 years ago. The whole world is changing. If you find you are not happy with MT work, then I would seriously look at a different career path.

Strike??? - Silly Rabbit

[ In Reply To ..]
I detect a plant or two who answered your post. I noticed they even tried to sway you away from the profession. Hinting that you did not have to work as an MT and to possibly try something else. The direction this industry is taking reeks of a conspiracy to discourage American MTs out of existence through horrible pay, undecipherable dictation, etc. In some weird way, our expertise is their most dangerous threat. If we all just go away, they can send all the off-shore and/or technologically mechanize transcription forcing the doctors to work harder and to accept an inferior product. The malpractice lawyers will have a field day.

The perk of work-at-home has served to separate and isolate us as a workforce and now we are pretty much unprotected. Striking will not fix it. I think a public awareness campaign would work better.

Strike...not gonna work - IMHO

[ In Reply To ..]
To work you need an organized group, ie: a union, organization or several organizations under the same umbrella. A strike will not work...what are you going to strike for, some have full benefits already so they aren't going to strike for benefits, some get a shift differential and they aren't going to strike for shift differential. In other words...there are too many variables with too many hands in the pot and too many pots, to have a strike work. My ex worked for an oil refinery and when they went on strike they could shut the whole industry down from coast to coast, I worked for a large HMO and when we struck we could shut all of our So Cal entities down. We as MT's, some of which are IC's, some of which are working in-house, some in MTSO's, it won't work.

ROFLMAO - Ann

[ In Reply To ..]
Wow, so there's a deep, dark conspiracy at work with the goal of getting all American MTs to find other work so it can all be sent overseas? Um, OK. I'm not even sure what to do with that; it is absurd on so many levels.

Maybe someone needs to put some new tinfoil in her hat.

Conspiracy to Discourage American MTs - Silly Rabbit

[ In Reply To ..]
Yes, there is a conspiracy. It is deep. It might not be that dark, but it is green. It is a cash grab conspiracy. That is just how big business works to undermine, overthrow and reap the spoils. Qualified American transcriptionists are the most expensive, even if we are getting minimum wage, and there are those who feel we are needless overhead that they can do without and are seeking ways to do without us.

Thats why I refuse to do VR, too. No way am I going - to train a software program to replace me.

[ In Reply To ..]
nm

It's not a conspiracy - Ann

[ In Reply To ..]
It's just business. Technology will replace more U.S. MTs in the long run than offshoring will, and those offshore MTs will be replaced as well. Of course it's all about the bottom line. It's business, and a less expensive process that provides acceptable results (acceptable as defined by the people paying for it) will always win.

It is no different than what happens in any industry. New technologies, new processes, new priorities, something always comes along to change the status quo. Change happens faster now than earlier in the industrial age, but we are really no different than the cottage weavers who were replaced by factories with big, fast machines that could produce at a vastly higher rate at a lower cost.

We have a choice. We can continue to whine that it's all unfair and everyone should stop and go back to the way things were before because we don't want to face reality (not gonna happen--nobody cares what we think is fair), or we can look around us and find a way to make the new processes work for us or acquire skills to make a living in another way.

I've made my choice. I'm starting school in a few weeks to become a physician assistant. I'm well over 50, but I'm really excited about my future. I don't have the time or energy to waste whining and complaining on and on about how the MT industry is so unfair and it's all somebody else's fault. It's not anyone's fault. It just is. It's reality. We can either face it and make it work for us, or we can allow it to leave us behind.

I think I love you - nm

[ In Reply To ..]
Get out of my head!

It is just repackaging - lipstick on a pig

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VR hasn't been effective since its inception. It just has better marketing now. More and more, clients are becoming disenchanted with it. We'll see what happens next.

VR is not the only technology application - Ann

[ In Reply To ..]
making inroads into the MT industry. It would be naive to assume that everything will go back to the "good old days" because VR is not yet delivering on its promises. There are other methods of capturing and storing patient data that do not involve the intervention of an MT. Standing by waiting for "them" to come to their senses is not going to bring back the high-paying MT jobs many of us used to have.

I still intend to go through with my plans. I wish you all the best with whatever your plans involve.

Plant? - Anonymous

[ In Reply To ..]
Get over yourself. In no way am I a plant trying to discourage others from transcription. I've been doing this job for 35 years and am just as concerned about the direction we are heading as anyone else. However, I am facing the reality that perhaps it is time to pursue something else because of all the changes that are occurring.

Silly rabbit - Anonymous

[ In Reply To ..]
"The perk of work-at-home has served to separate and isolate us as a workforce and now we are pretty much unprotected."

Yes it was a perk, it seems that everyone wanted to work at home. Be careful what you ask for, it has blown up in your faces.

Sorry to hear about your circumstances, but take my word - I has not blown up in my face

[ In Reply To ..]
Or many others. Your situation is not the same as everyone elses.

Circumstances - Anonymous

[ In Reply To ..]
Then why do you want to strike?

I DONT want to strike -ooops now I understand your message - Sorry - my misinterpretation

[ In Reply To ..]
You meant that having a strike would blow up in your face. I thought you meant all MTs who work at home the industry has blown up in our faces. That's why I was saying it hasn't blown up in mine or others.

Sorry, my error.

Oops - Anonymous

[ In Reply To ..]
Who's on first, what's on second....I probably confused you by quoting you in my message, sometimes it's hard to tell who started the discussion. Anyway, I think we are all agreed on the issue of a strike.

It has not blown up in my face and it will not. - Silly Rabbit

[ In Reply To ..]
My circumstances are not what they were, but they are not dire. I like working at home and would not change that. However, some MTSOs clearly and unscrupulously use the stand-alone status of the at-home MT to deny adequate monetary compensation. However, it has gotten so ridculous and rampant, of late, that even the American government will realize that it is time to intervene and legally criminalize the practices that have been leveraged against us. This will be rectified.

Rectified - Anonymous

[ In Reply To ..]
How long do you think it will take for the government to intervene?

Some of us have gotten rather used to eating regularly... - as well as having a roof overhead

[ In Reply To ..]
If I go on strike, I will have neither. Period.

And it wouldn't be "going on strike" anyway, it would be "stupidly quitting my job."

Opinions? Oh yeah - ancient mt

[ In Reply To ..]
The industry is changing. You will not stop that. Not by going on strike, not by stomping your feet, not by forming a union. It's called PROGRESS even if it means REGRESS for many MTs.

I'm not a newbie. I make good money. Not as much as I did 15 years ago, but 15 years ago, I ran my own service. I have a good employer. I don't work in-house. I *do* know better.

I have also worked in another part of the HIM industry and can tell you that EMR is going to plow through this industry. It won't matter if you're QAing offshore work, editing VR work, or inputting the work yourself. Cost is the most important factor to hospitals and you will NEVER return to 15 years ago. In fact, to even suggest it is sort of strange.

There will be a contingent of medical transcriptionists who are at the top of their game and will maintain a presence in the field. Then there are a bunch of medical typists who may find work in doctor offices as scribes but more than likely will not and will have to find a new field.

There are a bunch of businesses already being spun off the availability of an EHR. These are ALL for profit businesses. I would recommend rather than striking, look into how else you might avail yourself of the new technology and get the education you need to do so.

Informatics Analyst, datamining, clinical research. The next "show me the money" gigs.

I share those opinions-get proactive and educated and you will stay in this field and do well if you - CaliDeb-nm

[ In Reply To ..]
nm

do well if you are inclined to. But bottom line for everyone is the almight dollar. - CaliDeb - nm

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nm

Its something weve been needing for a long time! (nm) - Rocky Raccoon

[ In Reply To ..]
nm

Good luck to ya - I can always use your work - that you wont be doing. (nm)

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nm

Youre welcome to it. And my pitiful pay, too. - Rocky Raccoon

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nm

feel about a strike? waste of time...but you go girl, I'll wait here. - bigMISTAKEhuge NM

[ In Reply To ..]
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