How does a medical transcriptionist get paid?

The Medical Transcriptionist is paid by the character line in most cases. A character line in is considered as 65 characters. It is important to have a high-accuracy percentage on the reports that you transcribe. Most doctors do require that you have 98% accuracy or better on the completed report. This is because each of the transcribed reports will go into the patient medical file.

A patient’s medical file needs to have accurate information about their visit with the doctor, current and past medications, any tests that they have had done, as well as any diagnosis that doctors have given them. Inaccurate medical reports can lead to malpractice suits or confusion with future doctors when they refer to previous reports.

When you’re getting paid by the character line, you need to be able to type at a minimum of 65 wpm or better. However, your typing speed is not as important as your accuracy percentage. Your typing speed is what is going to help determine your average pay per hour; yet if you have a low accuracy percentage you will have a hard time keeping a job as an MT.

There are programs out there to help increase your typing speed. You can use a medical text expander that will help you get more work done in less time. The way a medical text expander works is that you can create abbreviation shortcuts that will expand out complete medical phrases, terms, and even report templates. These programs can range anywhere between a hundred dollars to several hundred dollars or more.

There is one program that we do recommend called Speed Type. It is reasonably priced and works very well for MTs. You can also create macros, templates, and styles in Microsoft Word that will help increase your performance as a medical transcriptionist. We do show you how to turn MS Word into a text expander with video tutorials located in our student area.

A well-trained MT can make up to $50,000 or more a year. This will depend on your medical transcription knowledge, how fast you type, experience, and credentials. Overtime you can increase your credentials by taking exams through AHDI.

New MTs do not normally start out at the highest pay rate per year. However, you can make a nice living working at home as a medical transcriptionist even during your first year. It is the same thing if you went to college and got a degree specializing in a certain career field; you would not expect for your first job to be at the highest pay range. That would come with time and experience. The same thing holds true for new MTS.

It will take a little time to reach the higher pay rate scale. The average hourly pay is between $14 and $16 an hour for new MTs. This will depend on your typing speed, knowledge, and what the doctor is paying you per character line. New MTs that are averaging on the higher pay scale are usually using tools to help them produce more work in less time such as medical text expanders.

What is a medical transcriptionist expected to know?

You will need to know anatomy of the human body, medical abbreviations, medical terminology, pharmacology, and HIPAA privacy laws. Knowledge of current grammar, style and format for the reports are very important as well. Every MT should have AHDI’s Book of Style for the medical transcription. You should also have a good medical dictionary and prescription-drug reference CD or book. We recommend Stedman’s Medical Dictionary and Saunders Pharmaceutical Word Book or CD.

In our medical transcription training courses, we require that each student have the AHDI books and a medical dictionary. These are very important items that every successful medical transcriptionist should have.

It is important to know that medical transcription is like any other career field, successful MTs will need to keep up with any changes, or updates in the medical field that pertain to their career. Physicians, nurses, and other medical professionals are always increasing their knowledge of any new medications, medical conditions, changes in the HIPAA laws or any other vital information that pertains to their career field. The same is true for the medical transcriptionist; it is important that you keep up with any changes or updates for your career in which you are required to know.

MT: An MT is a person that completes a medical transcription course with proper training and receives a certificate of completion. An MT can work in the medical transcription career field after proper training. Every RMT and CMT started out as an MT. Some MTs have worked for years without getting further credentials such as an RMT or CMT. However, with the evolving changes in today’s world; we highly recommend after completing your medical transcription course that you take your career to the next level by becoming an RMT and then later a CMT.

RMT: An RMT is a person that has taken and passed the RMT exam. This exam is only given through AHDI. Before taking the RMT exam, you would need to have taken a medical transcription course with proper training and received a certificate of completion in medical transcription. You could then take the RMT (registered medical transcription) exam through AHDI. Once you pass the RMT exam you can put the RMT after your name. For example: Katie Robertson, RMT

CMT: A CMT is a person that has passed the CMT exam which is only given through AHDI In order to take the CMT exam you must have taken a medical transcription course and received a certificate of completion in medical transcription. You will need to have taken and passed the RMT exam given through AHDI. Once someone has worked in the medical transcription career field for at least two years and passed the RMT exam, they can then take the CMT exam through AHDI. AHDI also allows both the RMT and CMT exam to be taken at the same time as long as all requirements for the CMT exam have been met. Once you pass the CMT exam you can then put the credentials of CMT after your name.
For example: Katie Robinson, CMT

Many MTs will take their career further by becoming RMT or CMT. We recommend to our students that they work as an MT for at least three to six months before taking the RMT exam to gain more hands-on experience.

Increasing your credentials in the medical transcription career field is much like a nurse going from an LVN to an RN. Increasing your credentials not only shows you are serious about your career it also shows your potential employers that you are up to date on the knowledge that a medical transcriptionist should know.

The first step in becoming a medical transcriptionist is to get the proper medical transcription training and become an MT. MTatHome is rated one of the best medical transcription schools in giving proper training, hands-on practice with authentic doctor dictations, teaching the proper styles and format, anatomy, pharmacology, medical terminology, HIPAA laws, and much more.

We do recommend doing research on the various medical transcription schools available to you. It is important to research different schools and information on the career field when making a decision for your future.

We are rated one of the best medical transcription schools online. However, we are not the only one. There are several reputable schools that train in the medical transcription career field. Just be cautious when doing the research because there are also scams out there as well.

You want to make sure that the school you choose has been around for a while and is registered as an Accredited Business with the BBB. You also want to make sure that they offer you support throughout your training, and offer proper training with job assistance once you complete the medical transcription class.

The medical transcription school should follow the AHDI standards for medical transcription. This is very important! AHDI is formerly known as the American Association for Medical Transcription (AAMT). They are the health documentation experts, and all doctors will expect MTs to know the AHDI standards. These standards are in the AHDI Book of Style that we mentioned above.

One of the most important factors in choosing a school is to make sure they offer training with authentic doctor dictations in many different medical fields. Some schools have been known to have dictations that are read from a script and not by a real doctor.

The reason why it is important to have authentic doctor dictations is because doctors are known to speak fast, mumble and eat food while they are dictating the patient report. Some of them may even have accents that are little hard to understand. Training with authentic dictations will give you the hands-on experience of learning how to understand what the doctor is saying so you can properly transcribe the reports. If you are listening to a dictation that is read from a script by an actor; you will not get the experience of all the different types of situations you can run into when working as a medical transcriptionist.

 

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