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

Just realized - I started my first MT job

Posted: Nov 12, 2014

30 years ago today. I had my own office and my own set of doctors. Everyone was so kind and helpful that day. Fast forward 30 years and I feel like a total failure, making probably about as much as I did that day. All of my non-MT friends have retired and have lake property. Wow, I sure made a wrong turn!

I know how you feel. My first MT job was in - 1975. I worked for a small - msg

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medical transcription company in Southern California and had my own office. The more senior MTs had offices with windows and a view. We used IBM Mag-Card typewriters. I loved the Mag-Card because the memory was limitless - you just kept slipping in more cards.

Another small company I worked for after that was in the same general area. We were all in one big office, but it was very comfortable - had a real homey feel to it. There were windows, but I worked swing shift and so it was dark most of the evening when I was there. At dinnertime one of us would often make a quick run down the street for pizza, burgers or sandwiches. There were a total of six desks with early (1977) word processors that had printers that worked like a regular typewriter... with font keys and a carriage.

It seems like every time I changed jobs, the working space got more and more cramped, until I was eventually working at home in my bedroom for an MTSO, so you know how that goes.... they treated me like dirt... like I didn't know anything about medical transcription. Eventually I realized that NOTHING I could do would ever make it possible to live up to their ever-changing "standards", and the low pay wasn't particularly motivating, either. I finally gave up and left for what was probably the last in-house job around here. I thought I'd struck gold, but unfortunately the transcription dept. was closed a short time later, and we were all out on the street again.

I started in 1972 on an IBM typerwriter before - before the Selectrics.

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Nothing and no one will ever make me doubt myself and my abilities. What do they know anyway?

I had ab inhouse job - mom2huskies

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I worked there from 1985 to 2005 when they closed the department. I loved my job, but it has been a struggle since.

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