Clinic work versus acute care?

• Clinic work versus acute care? - Cindy

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Which do you feel you can get a better line count on and would you take a slight pay cut to do just clinic work?  Most acute care accounts have such difficult dictators and such I was wondering if it would just be better to go to a good clinic account even if it meant less per line.  Opinions? 

I was wondering if it is possible to make a good line count with a multi-speciality clinic.  I was offered a PT position; one with acute care and one with a multi-clinic.  Just wondering what you all thought.

I did pathology transcription for 13 years and have been doing acute care for 8 years now.  Pathology can be very detailed, especially in the hospital surgical setting where you have a lot of surgeons performing every type of surgery imaginable.  The specimens run the entire anatomical gamut.  If you are going to be doing pathology in a laboratory setting, such as LabCorp, your work will be repetitious and you should be able to use many macros. Also remember, in pathology you will have no meds and no equipment to research.  In the hospital surgical setting, you would have more detailed anatomy dictation than a typical hospital OP note, but you will not have this in the typical laboratory setting.  Pathology reports are also completed in stages that are dictated days apart, and that is the biggest difference between them and medical records type work, in my opinion.  If you have been successful in doing acute care for any length of time, you will be able to do pathology and do it very well.  My concern would be that you would become bored with the work.  In a lab setting you will probably be doing lots and lots of prostate and skin biopsies, and biopsies taken from EGDs and colonoscopies.  Best of luck in whatever you decide to do.  :)

There are a few posts already about Axolotl if you want to do a search.  A lot of negative lately.  Clinic work is not bad but the pay is average.  Acute Care is terrible.  90% ESL on some accounts and every account has conflicting Account Specifics so you really have to pay attention to which account you are on. (for example, if the dictator says 50 cc - you type on one account 50 cc, but on another 50 mL), and QA will nail you on that if you do it wrong.   Work comes in by TAT, so you may switch every other job between 2 or 3 accounts all day or get a string of the same horrible ESL dictator in a row.  No flexibility.  They are a small company with only enough MTs to cover incoming jobs.  You tell them what hours you are going to work and you have to be there at that specific time.  Really depends on what you are looking for in a new job.  Ask lots of questions.  Let us know how it goes. 

My company has been out of work quite a lot lately and their only explanation is you know how it is during the off-season but the off-season now has been pretty much all of this year. My question is are MTs now all paid the same way for notes as opposed to reports. I distinctly remember that MTs who did progress notes and ER notes were generally paid differently because the notes were so short it was next to impossible to get an adequate line count. I feel like I am getting shafted because I am reduced to doing progress notes on a daily basis and I am generally spending 10 hours a day just to make my 1100 lines. Keep in mind that these are still ESL doctors who either don't know or don't care about putting in demographics so that too still has to be looked up and in the end I may get 5 lines per report. I understand that things do change but if its gotten to this point then maybe I need to be the one to make the change.

acute care medical transcriptionist, and working from home the past 7 years, I have decided to go back out in the workforce.   I have an interview on Monday with LabCorp as pathology transcriptionist.   After almost 30 years in the medical transcription profession, and at age 50, I am facing no retirement benefits, no health insurance, no sick time or holiday or vacation time.   I know it's a little late to wake up and smell the coffee, but I figure in the next 15 years, I may have a little retirement to look forward to.      Anyone working for LabCorp know anything about the benefits?

I have been an MT for 20 years.  I have hired and trained MTs for a service.  There is a HUGE difference between clinic notes and acute care.  The poster who says she made the switch and didn't have problems is lucky and is probably a very good MT, who had a good base of knowledge to start with.  It can be done, but not in every case. 

Some MTs who work on clinic notes work for the same set of dictators every day typing about colds and aches and pains.  Dictators tend to say the same things over and over.  Most clinic notes are only a 2 or 3 paragraphs.  They work for the same set of dictators for years and even have their stuff canned, just pull it in and make the changes.

You put that same MT on an acute care account for a large teaching hospital and they may have a nervous breakdown, I've seen the meltdown, it's not pretty.  On an acute care account like that you may have all the specialities and subspecialties, probably 30-40 or maybe more, adults and peds, with all the dictators, anywhere from 5 to ??  And residents, let's not forget them.  And all the work types.  They are dictating DS, H&Ps, consults, ORs, clinic visits, progress notes, etc.  They are dictating about new procedures and medications that may not even be in reference books yet or that are experimental.  Some of those reports are 20-30 minutes long, 7 or 8 pages.

I'm not knocking the clinic MTs, but don't just assume because one does clinic notes, they can jump into acute care.  That would be very misleading and a total injustice to a newbie who read that and got into an acute care position, possibly setting themselves up for failure. 

The clinic work that I do is still low, but that was discussed below ... I don't think it has anything to do with the holidays, and I do not care anymore.

Generally, probably hospital work is the way to go as far as a steady stream of work.  With clinic work, doctors can take off, shut down totally for holidays, etc., which leaves a big hole, obviously.  That's just my opinion, of course.

It would be great to have just one great job you could rely on to always give you a nice fat check each time, but I am beginning to realize if I truly want to be safe, I need to hedge my bets with several other jobs as well.  At least until I win the lottery. 

I worked for about 10 years as an IC for clinc work, then lost my account (like you).  I got a job in house at my local hospital and also applied with a national for PT work at home with a teaching hospital.  Things were slow going at first, having to look a lot of things up, etc.  I left the in house job after a couple years to be at home full time again.  Being in house helped a lot because of having the other girls to help and I also learned the ins and outs of HIM dept.  Poster below is correct about teaching hospitals being difficult.  But if you are going to learn acute, you have to do them.  I find the work very interesting.  I now work at home as a full time employee for a teaching hospital and couldn't be happier.

See what companies will test you for acute care even though you don't have experience.  I passed my test by a national.  The test took me a while, looking things up, etc, but it was worth it.  Just remember things will be slow for a while.  I only did about 150 lines an hour in the beginning (now I am at 300+).