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

Looking to Interview a few MTs

Posted: Oct 12, 2013

Hello all! I am in my last semester for a Medical Transcription degree (what a ride!) and now as it is coming to an end I need to interview a few Transcriptionists to help me to fully understand the field that I am heading into. If you have the time and would like to teach a soon to be graduate on your ways of being an MT please let me know, I would greatly appreciate it. Whether you just started working as an MT or a seasoned MT, any help and knowledge would be greatly accepted.

I am also looking for a practicum opportunity which I have already started messaging companies about a few weeks ago but have yet to hear back. So this week I am going to start calling the different places.

Please either respond here or shoot me an email, amjl81@yahoo.com

Thank you!
ATC

;

What school are you attending? - Just curious

[ In Reply To ..]
Have you tried asking your school who hires their graduates? That is really what you should do.

Gateway Community College - ATC

[ In Reply To ..]
The teacher of the class wants us to find our own place, told us a general sense on who hires MTs and who does not. I have tried contacting a few of them and yet to hear back.

Wow - sm

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I don't know what to say. They are not willing to help you find a place, perhaps it's because they have no legitimate places to refer you to. This industry is rapidly deteriorating. You can interview me, but you and your instructor will probably not like my answers (or many other MTs for that matter).

I think we should all write this college and tell them - they should be ashamed

[ In Reply To ..]
of themselves for taking people's money. we have 2 years left at most. No one should be teaching this course.

Sound to me like - Old Pro

[ In Reply To ..]
You have been taken for a the royal ride of your life. The school is supposed to "give you an idea" about what MT is like. It is supposed to train you using the SUM program. (If they didn't, you won't get hired.) This business about "telling us in a general sense who hires MTs" is a bunch of baloney sausage. Doesn't the "school" have a placement office? Is the school a legit school? Did you check it out before you enrolled? How did you learn about this school? I have been in the MT world for over 40 years and have never heard of it.

Suggestion - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
Well, then I recommend you look them up online and see just who is on the advisory board, the faculty, etc. Know them folks?

MTSOs who should hire you - and a comment about practicums

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The Advisory Committee lists at least 2 or 3 MT business owners. If they won't hire you, there is a problem because their job on that Advisory Committee is to make sure the program teaches enough for graduates to get jobs with MTSOs just like them. I would ask them first and would not take "no reply" as an answer.

Also, if your school requires a practicum, THEY are responsible for setting it up, not you. They can set it up with one of those folks on the Advisory Committee.

Sorry to tell you, but... - MT

[ In Reply To ..]
It's a real bummer that your college is still even offering medical transcription as a career field. The jobs are drying up and there really is no future in this industry anymore. There are still some successful MTs, and I am one of them, but that is only because I lucked out to find a facility that needs transcriptionists still. Local hospitals and clinics are all switching to computer-based programs that do not use MTs, and those that do are selling out to big transcription companies that require lots of experience for little pay. Because of all the hospitals laying off their medical transcription departments, there are many, many MTs that have already been in the field for many years with lots of experience that are looking for jobs. Even the ones I have applied for and get a response say that they get over 400+ applications for every one job that is posted. This is also the reason for wages going down, down, down. Without having any experience, you will be lucky to get hired, and if you are lucky to get hired, you may not have the job for long or will be making minimum wage if it's paid on production like most MT jobs are. I wish you luck, but I would really have it out with your college for still offering the program.

Stay focused, don't give up, utilize all the resources you have, SM - MT52

[ In Reply To ..]
This is a changing field. You will more than likely be editing rather than typing. Get used to the different work types, ESL doctors, take notes. If you learn one hospital, the next will not be the same. You will entry level again.

Your school should have - xx

[ In Reply To ..]
given you this assignment in your first semester. It would have saved you whatever time and money you have invested in getting a "degree" in medical transcription.

Take a look at the Job Seekers board from the list to the left of this page. Note how many of the job ads require one, two, or more years of experience (school does not count as experience). Then look as the Jobs Wanted board. That's your competition. Note how much experience the MTs posting there have. That's what you're up against--a fairly limited number of jobs and a nearly limitless supply of experienced MTs looking for work.

You might luck out and find something locally. Otherwise, the job search is probably going to be long and frustrating.

Good luck to you.

Questions for you - MT headed

[ In Reply To ..]
What made you choose medical transcription as a career? Hopefully this is not the only thing you studied because your "degree" probably is not going to do much good in the real world. You could have saved your money and understood the field you will be entering long ago if you had only visited these forums or perhaps talked to some real world MTs. Your instructors are there to help you understand your field, that is what they are paid to do. I seriously doubt if you are going to find a practicum opportunity for a couple of reasons. First, employers don't have time to hand hold. Second, there are confidentiality issues related to internships and release of health information. What does your comment "what a ride!" refer to?

I would - immediately

[ In Reply To ..]
stop reading MT Stars message board. You will find nothing but despair and negativity here, most of which is based in MT reality. Just so your studies aren't a complete loss, you could try applying to MModal, Nuance, SoftScript and TTS, as it seems they are always hiring. Good luck!

Uh, I would have "interviewed" MTs way before paying for school. - mt2

[ In Reply To ..]
Sounds like you've been ripped off by your school. You should have went to one who has job placement.

And here's my interview: I make almost 1/2 of what I made 3 years ago with VR. Don't let anyone tell you any different. These companies expect a lot for crappy pay.

I have been a MT for over 30 years and I am totally disgusted with what this profession has turned into.

I have 7 years to go before I can retire. I cannot wait.

She should have "went"? - xx

[ In Reply To ..]
Seriously?

Get over yourself - XX

[ In Reply To ..]
People from different geographic areas speak differently, especially in informal situations such as this. Your post had nothing to do with the topic at hand. Your goal was to make fun of someone else's word choice to make yourself look/feel superior. But it did not make the other person look less intelligent, it only made you look like an ass.

There is no place in the world where SHOULD HAVE WENT is good grammar - Professional MT

[ In Reply To ..]
We are supposed to know better, and no matter how "informal" the situation is, bad grammer makes me cringe inside, and I have lived in just about everywhere. Furthermore, having interviewed and hired more than a few MTs in my day, an aspiring MT whose grammar is that terrible would not get a job from me, ever! So my advice to you, young MT starting in the business, be sure you are never heard misusing the Queen's English.

No one said it was "good grammar" - only that

[ In Reply To ..]
you and every grammar nazi here needed to get over yourselves. No one here was interviewing for a job, certainly not a job with you. If that person wants to type the way they speak, so what!

My advice to you, you pretention windbag, is to be careful you don't break your neck falling off that high horse you're on.

Get mad, get glad or scratch your ass. It don’t make a lick of difference to me. I'll talk as good or as bad as I wanna. I don't need no job from the likes of your uppity self.

get mad, get glad or scratch your ass, it don’t make a difference to me.

Pretention windbag? You mean pretentious? - anon

[ In Reply To ..]
LOL!

Boy! I sure do hope I grow up to be as cool - as you - nm

[ In Reply To ..]
xXxx

I agree with Professional MT..SM - Old Anon

[ In Reply To ..]
I have seen SHOULD HAVE WENT a few times on this site, and I also cringe every time. It's got to be regional slang because I don't think you learned that in school. I'd really drop that slang if I were you. It doesn't put you in the best light even when used informally. It makes you sound really uneducated. Sorry, got to go, my high horse is waiting.

My goodness - you must be

[ In Reply To ..]
fabulously wealthy with your ability to read minds.

I pointed it out because it needed to be said. It is not a regional or colloquial "variation." It is wrong.

This is not English 101 - XX

[ In Reply To ..]
Go get a teaching license if you want to teach grammar. It did not "need to be said." YOU felt the need to say it. There was no NEED for it. /

Hmmm. This seems to have - xx

[ In Reply To ..]
touched a nerve. Does your own grammar often need to be corrected? Otherwise, why would you be so touchy if someone who should be expected to know better is called out on a glaring error?

What a perfectly mature response - XX

[ In Reply To ..]
Since I find your pompousness distasteful, naturally I must have some deep-seated idee fixe for grammar correction. That makes perfect sense! It couldn't simply be that I detest your supercilious attitude. Or the fact that you didn't "correct" anyone's grammar at all. You were simply snide for the sake of being snide. No, no… it is something aberrant in my personality. I see it so clearly now.

Please respond now with something befitting a cultivated erudite such as yourself.

interview - cindy

[ In Reply To ..]
Sounds like you got enough answers on this board for your interview. We are all older MTs, been doing this for years and everything they said is true. Don't despair though, you can still go into the medical field for something else. You obviously already have the medical terminology and anatomy and physiology and you can put that towards something else. I told me friends 3 years ago that wanted to go into this field not to and some didn't believe me till they found out on their own. You may always be able to go into coding and something. Just don't think that this is your last stop because its really hard to find something now.

I agree, and... - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
I agree that you should be able to put what you have taken towards a more realistic program.

My caution is to be very careful about just WHAT program you consider. That college seems to have an awful lot of "degree" and certificate programs in things that seem kind of hokey. Here, those same programs would take 4 months at adult ed night school. Just as MT does not constitute a 2-year degree, neither does about 3/4 of the rest of what they teach.

An example is the health unit coordinator program. Not only has my facility gotten rid of all our HUCs -- they are no longer necessary with our EHR -- but jobs were scarce to begin with and minimal training was required.

Other courses, like the research coordinator, medical manager, and medical information programs, don't go far enough for you to get a job. We look for master's degreed research coordinators, MBAs and MHAs for managers, and an RHIA for health information management.

That series of health informatics courses related to electronic records? You aren't going to get a job without a higher degree first. There is just too little that you can do with just one of those programs. You couldn't even get a job answering phones for an IT dept.

They don't teach coding and don't even have anything accredited by AHIMA, so even those fields are out.

About the only things that look useful are the medical assisting, nursing and radiology/ultrasound tech programs. If you can transfer into one of those, that would be good.

Medical assisting might be closest to what you are now studying and the transcription might help you get a job as an MA.

I would insist that the school facilitate your transfer into another program. I don't think they should charge you for it, either. They really sold you a pig in a poke with the MT.

Wow, amazing - ATC

[ In Reply To ..]
I think all this feedback is amazing. Needless to say my little 'report' will have the majority of what is said on this subject. I thank all of you for your input. I had big hopes for it but always heard from the teachers and last semester how a fellow student found a practicum and was offered a job through them.
I have already decided that I would go back to school for mortuary science since I have the biology and anatomy classes all set to go (plus there will always be dead people), so I guess this just helps that decision and rather than waiting a year I will try to get into that program next school year.
Again, thank you all for your responses and being blunt about the whole field.

interview - cindy

[ In Reply To ..]
I feel so bad for you, but sometimes something bad turns into something for the better. Hopefully it will all work out. I agree there should always be jobs for that field, unless it gets inundated with people doing it (LOL). Don't think that will happen.

interview - cindy

[ In Reply To ..]
Just another bit of info about this field. When I started in the 80s I could walk into any job interview and get hired on the spot. Everyone was desperate for medical transcriptionists. Today there are more transcriptionists than jobs, just like a lot of other fields I guess, but that is the harsh reality of why no job is calling you back because they have lots of applicants with lots of experience just waiting. Anyway, good luck to you.

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