Medical administrative assistants play an important role in making a physician’s office run smoothly from coordinating client appointments to the fixing paperwork. Previous healthcare and other administrative working experiences would be helpful and a two year degree program and a medical assistant certification would be nice tools in advancing one’s medical administrative assistance career. Medical administrative assistant is considered among the promising careers in the health care industry these days. A medical administrative assistant career suits individuals who desire to work in healthcare, would prefer an office setting and have excellent interpersonal skills. Many medical assistants work in physician’s clinics and offices, filing and taking care of patient records, doing the insurance paperwork and arranging several laboratory services. Medical assisting is a rapidly increasing field and there are numerous opportunities for career advancements for ambitious professional medical admin assistants.
What is medical assisting?
Medical assisting is one of the emerging fields in allied health sciences these days. According to statistical surveys conducted by the US Department of Labor, the advances in health care technology has brought about the increasing demand for medical assistants who can assists doctors and medical practitioners in their daily clinic life. Medical assisting consists of tasks such as answering phone calls, setting appointments, explaining different medical procedures, sterilizing clinic equipments and so much more. A certain medical administration assistant is expected to call in prescriptions, deal with billing clients, work on insurance paperwork and bookkeeping. Medical assisting doesn’t require an official licensing process but getting a professional certification is an advantage. Most employers these days would prefer individuals who went through a formal training in a vocational school, technical college and even accredited online learning institutions. However, there are optional certification programs offered by the AAMA and the National Board of Examiners that allows medical assistants to perform other medically-related duties such as drawing blood specimens and taking X-rays.
Where can I find medical office assistant programs?
These medical assistant programs can be found in universities, vocational school, technical colleges and other online educational institutions. Before enrolling for a medical assistant training program, check the institutions approval from different accrediting bodies to make sure you are getting the appropriate coursework for the medical administrative curriculum. Future salaries would depend upon an individual’s knowledge and skills in the field. Ophthalmic medical assistant salary tends to be higher since it is a specialized field.
Administrative medical assistant pay: How much will I be compensated?
Many medical admin assistants are compensated based on their specialty knowledge, previous working experiences and level of training. There are other employers who would conduct an on the job training with a medical office administrative program course. Individuals who have obtained a CMA certification and those who have previously worked in hospitals, clinics, specialty offices and treatment facilities usually get more even from the early stages of employment. Entry level pay for medical assistants may range from $10 to $12 but many employers grant salary raises after a certain probationary period. Experienced MAs usually make around $15 to $20 per hour depending upon the type of office and location. Specialty clinics usually pay larger compared to primary care ones. After two to three years of working experience in this chosen field, medical admin assistants have an average monthly income range of around $2000 to $2500. Primary care clinics usually don’t pay as much as specialty doctors do such as those in allergy & immunology, dermatology, orthopedics, gastroenterology, internal medicine and etc.