Excellent post. I totally agree.
Posted By: We get it, QALady. on 2007-07-09
In Reply to: Those who do not adapt will become extinct - you have choices - SM
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Totally agree...The Life of David Gale is excellent!
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I like your post and totally agree
My wanting to do my job, make the money I want and my loving to work at home now (althought plenty of years in work force before allowed to work out of my home) gives me the get up and go that I want and need to work like I do. I am amazed at the people who take care of everything else around them and then wonder why they are not grounded, able to focus, making a decent salary and the list goes on. I could care less about outside interference- does not bother me and never has. I am much more grounded, I guess, than lot of these posts.
I totally agree with your post...
It takes someone with terrific grammar skills, and even those of us who have been around a while still take an initial period of growing pains when put on a new account, new platform, etc. So, I say dive right in. What has this OP got to lose? Nothing.
I would again as above recommend just sending those resumes with a cover letter that is personal to that particular advertisement.
The rate of pay has gone down, but the technology has come such a long way that I find myself making more money now than I ever have and I've been doing this for 20+ years. It is a very good field for me, and I am happy with the part I play in today's healthcare. I feel accomplished at the end of the day. I really do. 
I totally agree with your observations and post...sm
Did anyone else see the movie "Wag the Dog?" If so, you will share my strong doubt about the validity of a lot of the information coming from the Bush Administration in general. I'd also like to know what happened to bin Laden after that conveniently-aired video the week before elections wherein he threatened the safety of every state who voted for him. Not that I want any more attacks, but it does seem "strange" that nothing ever materialized from that, don't you?!!!!!
That was a good post! Totally agree.
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totally agree with this post by noyb
very well put - a voice of reason !! :)
Bravo! Good post. I totally agree. sm
I too have been in this business for a long time (almost 20 years). I also have a good friend who is an RN who will ask me questions about certain things that she hasn't read up on because it is not in her field of "expertise".
If someone I know says something like, "I have this pain that won't go away. . ..", I say, "you need to make an appointment with your doctor. If someone says the doc put them on a drug and can't pronounce the name, I can give them the correct way to say it.
But in my experience, I can tell (in my areas of expertise) when something is wrong. I would never say, "I think he has this or that." I would say, "I really don't like the looks of that and it might need to be looked at by the doctor. Even if I do know from experience what it may be.
In the case of an NP ignoring the MT's concerns, I find that disturbing. That seems to say that personal objections are getting in the way, which should never happen in the medical field, regardless of what level you are at, if there is even what may apper to be a valid concern.
Oh, I totally agree, but go up to the "Good Morning" post. I'd rather have your input.
v
Excellent post! I copied this post and...
am going to show it to my shrink so he can understand my frustration with my new "profession!" By the way, how much you wanna bet he pulls in 300$ an hour and has two years of schooling on me! Hmmmmmmm. Okay, you flamers, don't tell me to go back to school...I am thinking about it. Hmmmm
Thanks for the excellent post!
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EXCELLENT POST QA
Thanks so much for posting. Believe it or not, your post made me feel good. I am new, and am lucky enough to have mostly good dictators and only a few really bad ones. (But the account with the SKIPPING-TAPE-THING GOING ON IS DRIVING ME NUTS!!) Anyway, I know QA can understand about the skipping tape thing. I proofread every single report (so you know I am not making much money), but I rarely hear from QA, so I must be doing something right. It is just nice to finally hear from someone from QA on this board and to know they appreciate a job well done. I have e-mailed QA back, thanking them for the help, but lately have not, thinking that I might be annoying them - taking time away from their work, but now I know that e-mail might be appreciated instead. Now...we will probably get some slams from people having a bad day, but I thank you for writing. You should post more often, and we all would LOVE to hear some of the funnier "bloopers"
Excellent post! Well said!
My kids belonged to a bowling league..my oldest boys being in public school. The youth director confided in me that their 'homeschool league' kids were SO much more respectful and better behaved and an absolute pleasure to work with than the 'regular leagues.'
You are correct. Homeschool does not mean isolation whatsoever, unless, of course, you are way out in the sticks without a car, etc!
I homeschooled my daugter for 5 of her school years. If there was a sociability contest, she would WIN hands down! Everyone says so!! Her very best feature!
Excellent post!
I totally agree with you. This is the most intelligent post I have see in a long time. I have always felt that it was the large services and MTSOs who stir the pot to keep MTs at each other's throats. It's a lot easier to manipulate us one on one. If we were united and had someone to "get our backs" they wouldn't be able to get away with the cheap slave labor they are trying to pass off these days. I would really, really like to see some real union amongst MTs. The only way we can fight what is happening to our industry is to fight it together as a group! AAMT has been a HUGE disappointment to us. We need something better. I think one of the main reasons we see so much bickering and back stabbing on here is that there is no job satisfaction anymore. There is nothing to feel proud of. We get beat down on all sides. It would be great to be able to look forward to going to work every day again. I know we need a union, but have no idea how to go about starting one. Where is Norma Rae when you need her?
EXCELLENT post! Here's something else....(sm)
A very similar job to MT, with only a slightly different twist to it, is COURT-REPORTING. Back in 1975, I (stupidly!) decided at the same time my friend was going to school for court-reporting, to instead to go school for medical transcription. At the time, both paid about the same, court-reporting being slightly higher. But that made sense, as she had to stay in school longer.
So here we are, 30 years later, and MT has become a crummy sweatshop job with what adds up to less than minimum wage in many instances. I live hand-to-mouth, and will never be able to own a home, or most likely even to retire. My friend, on the other hand, is paid a top salary, owns a home on the California coast, works when & if she wants to, and has tons of work. You never hear about court reporting going offshore, because it's a legal docoment that is being typed, and I guess a recording of the court proceedings won't cut it - it has to be transcribed live for it to be considered evidence. Same with taking depositions.
MTs are every bit as literate, highly trained and professional as court reporters, and we, too type medicolegal documents. At any time, any report we type could end up as evidence if that particular patient or doctor were to end up in court.
So it sure seems to me that if transcribed medical reports are going to be used within the American judicial system for any reason, then they should certainly be considered important enough to be typed by American CITIZENS who live within our own borders. NOT by people with green cards, NOT by illega aliens, and most certainly NOT by non-residents.
If our profession is compared side-by-side with court-reporting, it may be a bit like comparing apples & oranges in some respects, but in other respects they are still very similar, and are both FRUITS of the American labor force. Yet one is a high-paying, respectable career and the other is considered by many to not even be a "real job!
That has come about because of corporate greed, and by people in other countries looking to make quick, easy money.
Of course, the reason this has happened to MT and not court-reporting is mainly due to one thing: Our ability to work on PCs at home. If court reporters could sit at home and listen to court proceedings on a recording or over a live connection, they would have found themselves facing the same loss of respect and income that we have had to deal with.
excellent post. nm
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That is an excellent post.
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Excellent post!
Good insight into the complexity of trade, competition, and lower salary workers.
What an excellent post!
Thank you, thank you! I am a bit depressed reading the post above yours. This is exactly the kind of attitude that enables these companies to lower their rates.
I think you spoke for a lot of us.
Excellent post.
Excellent post.
nm
A most excellent post
I think sometimes, in our zeal to get hired, we throw everything into the pot. We declare that we possess every skill that might help us to make the cut over other applicants. We're a nurse, we transcribe, we can make coffee, can get grease spots out of a Brooks Brothers suit, drop his kids at day care on the way to work - no! it's no trouble at all, really! - whatever. In this case, having your office nurse also be your Transcriptionist probably seemed an attractive prospect, until the doctor's wife figured they were paying twice for what she thought they should be paying for only once. Now these very skills have been turned against the worker. So your points 1, 2 and 3 are particularly valid.
I have seen ads for MTs in local papers and the description of duties sometimes says, 'medical transcription, reception duties, appointments, filing, other duties as needed.' Then I know I don't even want to apply for the position, as I have no idea how I could be MT as well as receptionist. How frustrating it would be to have my concentration constantly interrupted! This practice wants a secretary/receptionist they can make transcribe as well. Lots of luck getting someone who can do both well.
Any professional should balk at being told that a salary covers 'anything the boss expects' them to do. Especially if this throws out an established arrangement and doubles someone's work load. While we all like to be team players, if only the owner gets a tropy this diminishes our team spirit considerably.
I'm of two minds on this. I would either agree and simply not bust my butt getting the transcription done until it was piled so high SOMETHING had to change. Certainly there is a limit to how backed up this practice will allow its reports to become? Meanwhile I'd be looking for new employment. Of course, as the reports piled up, you have to know the office manager would be timing your trips to the bathroom with a stop watch and accusing you of wasting time on her dime (as seems to be her nature) but I'm sure you could perform all your usual nursing duties with just a bit less alacrity in order not to appear idle. Or I would simply call their bluff and refuse to go along (which might be shooting myself in the foot unless I had another job to go to. )
Excellent post and viewpoint
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What an excellent post you wrote! (sm)
Everything is a hit-the-nail-on-the-head ACCURATE description of the mess the MT industry has become today. If the doctors & hospitals truly don't care about such gross mistakes in their dictated LEGAL documents, I wonder why they even bother at all.
I also wonder how long MTSO's really think they are going to get the most experienced MTs out there by continuing to chip away at their pay and benefits. I'm expected to turn out perfect medical reports, which means, even with 30+ years of experience, that when doing difficult accounts, I can't blast away at Mach II on my reports - I have to spend a little more time looking up state-of-the-art treatments, drugs, etc., and then extra time proofreading each report afterward (which is difficult when you're proofing your own work). And yet in order to earn what would normally constitute 8 hrs. worth of pay, I often end up working 12-hour days. And yet my rent (which is way below-market, I might add) still consumes more than half of my income each month. (I went to school for WHAT??)
WOW!! Excellent eloquent post!
You covered everything and did it so well that there's not much to add.
I will say, though, that I have been in a profession in which I was in a union. I have plenty of gripes about the union, but it'd be nice to have that protection here. It'll never happen, though, because of the other shortcoming that plagues this industry: Offshoring. It used to be that, if you worked hard and were good at your job, you had some leeway because you just *knew* that your company wouldn't let you go because they valued you so much. Not so these days, at least not the company I work for, and not from many others if what I read on these boards is true. Most of the companies have a virtually endless supply of maleable workers who will work for little to nothing. I get the very distinct feeling that if I said I was quitting tomorrow, they'd almost be happy for it. After all, they can now just backfill my position with one of those nameless, faceless people in India, the Philippines, Viet Nam, or any of the various other 'offshore' places.
A friend who works for SPi and is very good at what she does, when she told her supervisor that she had gotten another job offer, was actually told by that supervisor her advice was to take it! Back in 'the day' and not too very long ago, the response would've been 'how can we keep you?' Every single QA or Editor that I know is actively searching for a new job, some in this same declining industry, others in completely other fields.
After working so hard for so many years, I now feel just extremely tired - body and soul, completely demoralized, struggling to have any pride in my work any more. It's bad now and getting worse. I only hope the above poster is correct and things will make a turn-around, but frankly, I'm having a really hard time seeing it or even mustering the optimism to envision it. :'(
Excellent informative post!
You have given us all something to think about because you are right. We are not the only field this is happening to.
Lydia - I think your post was excellent however
I would like to bring up the new technology of VR where the use of word Expanders no longer has the impact that they have with straight typing.
I am doing editing and when I talk to others they were doing 300-400 lines with straight typing and word expanders. Now they are editing that same work and perhaps doing an average of 400 lph and yet making half as much money. It is an entirely different skill set learning to navigate quickly and get the work edited for speed, something which I am struggling with. I would love it if editors would share their speed tips but usually all the posts I get go something like this: I do 500 lines and hour and make more money editing OR I had to take a pay cut editing but no specifics as to why or how to build speed. So that is not really helpful as to why there is more or less $ with editing. I use my keyboar and not my mouse. I am working as hard as I can but I only can do maybe 100 more lines tops with editing than I can with straight typing but my pay has dropped by 50%. I don't see editing going away so to that end it seems as if the pay is dropping in transcription. Does anyone else see where I am coming from????
Thank you for an excellent post. I wish we had our own board. nm
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Excellent post and info...a must read.nm
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Here's an excellent link to a post for suggestions
Here's a link to an excellent post at Productivity Talk by Tonks. I'm trying this out right now. If it works, I'm going to send her a big thank you.
http://www.productivitytalk.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=3683
Excellent post! There are still people with passion out there - that is great to know...
Sometimes everyone sounds so harsh and cold about all of this.
Best wishes to you, and good for you for finding another way of making a living.
Hopefully, those of us over 45 will have luck finding jobs...
I should research what happened years ago when the steel mills shut down, or when automation took over. People must have had some kind of help when they got their pink splips...
Post not EXCELLENT, but completely out of touch with reality
like you think the MT's control the pay in the MT world? Either you need the job and you take it for the pay or you have another option. MT's without another option will take the job at 6 cpl, or 4 cpl or whatever. When working at McDonald's becomes an option that is equivalent to MT work, then MT's will choose McDonald's.
The Transcriptionist is just ONE cog in the wheel of the whole industry. If people continue to look at only the MT's part, they miss the big picture. If all it took were people saying Let's all stand up together and demand better wages, then why couldn't the cashiers at the grocery stores across the US do the same thing? They can't. Because it they don't cashier for $8 an hour, there's somebody else who will. Same thing has happened with transcription. If you don't take the job at 6 cpl, somebody else will. It might be somebody from India (which you so quickly discounted) but I'll let you in on a little secret. The people from India who are doing MT typically have 2 master's degrees. They are hungry for work. They are intelligent, competent individuals, willing to work hard. They might have a little bit of a quality issue right now because of the language barrier, but it won't be long before you have lots and lots of Indian MT's with 2 years experience, who have learned from their mistakes, who have learned American idioms... and then you are really going to see the bottom drop of out the market.
I agree, very excellent free program. sm
You could also run your *disc Cleanup* program to delete files, etc. Also go to My Computer, Internet Options, and Delete. Delete files, cookies, and internet history. That all helps! good luck.
Excellent, I agree...Your comment summoned it all up!...nm
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The above post totally correct
IN the 80s I made almost 60 thousand but not anymore. Some will come on and say they make that much but just with a 40 hour week, not anymore.
Totally ELOQUENT post! This should be sent
.
I totally understand your post, and the fact that
the fact that you (and the rest of us) are paid so little for high expected volumes of production, that absolutely ANYTHING that happens to slow us down, even a tiny little bit, is often a financial disaster for those of us living paycheck-to-paycheck and just barely getting by. If we were FAIRLY COMPENSATED for the work we do, instead of being continually CHEATED, UNDERVALUED AND UNDERPAID, then minor glitches like new software, new accounts, ESLs, would be just a bump in the road, not potential food stamps and/or homelessness.
I, too have plenty of work. And I, too am appalled at the fact that no matter how many hours I work, how much faster I try to type (without compromising quality), it seems like it's always SOMETHING. Right when you're clicking along and the income is starting to go up a little bit, they will:
A. Hit you with harder accounts, ESLs, or scratchy, fuzzy-sounding files that even a bat couldn't hear clearly.
B. Have a huge push to get absolutely everything in TAT, right before a holiday or long weekend when you KNOW it's going to fall off, and half of us will be scrounging for work.
C. 'Upgrade' the working platform, (which translates to: )
D. Put all these obstacles and hoops you have to jump through in your way, which are big time-wasters: Meetings, 'training', and various PC and program tweaks.
E. Decide to take their server down for maintenance, and it's always during YOUR shift.
F. While you're midway through a l-o-n-g, 1 hr, 45-min. dictation, which has a mushmouthed/ESL dictator, is very technical and requires a lot of research on drugs, procedures and equipment that is too new to be in the references yet, and during the entire dictation, a loud going-away party for one of the nurses is going on just a few feet away from the dictator, who is eating and while dictating, and occasionally turning away from the microphone to watch the tipsy party attendees, all the while continuing to dictate. The report was of course STAT, and was 30 min. away from TAT when you downloaded it. Then your supe calls you in the middle of all this and asks you what you're doing, and where the report is.
I totally agree
This is a 10-year-old girl, not a mass murderer. She is in a lot of pain, having suffered a most significant loss, and is trying to reach out, not always in positive ways, but the flowers are wonderful. Where they came from does not matter. PLEASE do not read anything nefarious into her actions.
She needs help, and smiles, and maybe a hug when she is ready.
Fear is a terrible thing, particularly when it turns normally rational folks into masses of paranoid jelly. I despise that we have come to this.
I agree with you totally, thank you!
I totally agree with you..
I have been editing work that would just BLOW YOUR MIND. On top of mispelled and misused words, we have bad grammar and punctuation and then typing something different than what the doctor says and if you read it, it doesn't make sense. For example, I cam across this yesterday, "which was done when he was very-very young apparently a ditch is inspected." He actually said "which was done when he was very, very young. Apparently, it did get infected." I come across contractions, etc. This gal actually argued that her scores are always 98%. There were so many redlines on her work, I might as well have scrapped it and typed it myself. I don't know if this is due to schools or not, but when I was a newbie, I don't remember making that bad of mistakes!!!
Thank you, I agree totally
Get over it already. They cheated you, are cheating you. You MUST like it if you stay and continue to be treated that way. How many other MTs have had a bad job???? Trust me you guys at MQ are NOT the only ones. There are TONS of jobs out there. Go get one, that is what the rest of us do. Go do it.
I so totally agree sm
I posted my resume on MT Stars a couple of years ago and, like you, I was flooded with calls. The company I selected, I didn't even know existed. I have been a very happy camper for 2 years, plenty of work, decent pay, great tech support, wonderful people who make you feel like "family." Best move I ever made.
I think maybe the reason why people keep allowing themselves to be used and abused by companies with sporadic work is the known versus the fear of the unknown factor. Believe me, the stress of starting a new job is small potatoes compared to never knowing you will have enough in your paycheck to cover the bills!
I totally agree with you!!
I have stuff come up on my screen that just blows me away. Most of it could be fixed if they just read over their work and saw that the sentences do not make sense.
VERY WELL SAID!! Totally agree with you!!
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I TOTALLY agree with you...
What looks cute and hip on a 20-year-old just looks cheap and classless on a 50-year-old. I'm 45, so I'm not some young thing poking fun at middle-aged women. Older women can look very classy and actually YOUNGER if they "dress their age" and by that I don't mean mumurs and bedroom slippers or stretch pants and sack-like tops. When I dress up I might wear a nice tailored pinstriped suit or something like that. I do NOT go out in anything from the junior department. There's a reason for "junior" clothing and it's not size, it's the style of fashion. To all the women who disagree with you, I'm afraid the notion that older women look young and cute in daisy dukes, a belly shirt, and a navel piercing comes from those who dress that way " thinking" they look hot, not necessarily the opinion of others in general.
I totally agree with you. sm
We never went on vacation with our kids and left them with grandparents to come back and find out that our own lack of parenting resulted in somthing that our own kids may have been doing behind our backs all along.
Give me a break. Blame it on gramma? How about staying home with your kid and taking a good look around to realize that he's the one that's hiding things, not your MIL.
There is obviously a lot of hatred between DIL and MIL here.
Message for you mom, "get a grip." This stuff doesn't all happen because their at gramma's for the week. You're obviously doing something wrong here. Forget your "vacations." and your "rules" and be there for your kids. Teenagers LIE. It's been going on for centuries.
You can go on "vacation" when they're all grown up and gone. By the sounds of your message, I would say the sooner they go, the better.
I agree totally.
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I totally agree! Thank you!
The people who are criticizing seem to think that the president can just snap his fingers and immediate help will appear. There are people all over the country who are going there to help, donating money by the thousands, etc., and nobody says anything positive about that. Nobody could have predicted a disaster such as this and it takes time to get things rolling, but it IS being done.
I totally agree
Many physicians, young and old, are not on the technology coat tails. They have absolutely no interest in changing the way they do things. I think that as long as using this technology does not become an across the board required mandate by some governing agency, transcriptionists will be in high demand until doomsday.
totally agree
!!
Totally agree with you
He always was respectful and nice to everyone, a good guy but when he sang, it was a different Marty. I only tuned in to see him perform and then would change the channel. He reminded me of an Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam when he sang with so much angst. Loved it!
I totally agree. sm
I used to be married to a hunter. The whole idea felt wrong to me and I hate guns. I haven't had to deal with hunting or guns for 20 years now.
I'm sure I will get blasted by some NRA people for saying I hate guns, but oh well. 
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