I promise you - I begin work at 7:00 p.m. - I'm only PT, and my day always begins with
Posted By: Dancin Shoes on 2005-08-16
In Reply to: Well! Tonight is the night I start 3rd shift. Any suggestions on how - MT
stat, H&Ps, consults, etc! I love it!
When they have me working mornings I am getting special procedures, ops, caths, and don't like it one bit! Maybe 2nd shift would work for those who just can't see themselves working from 11 to 7. Good luck!
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He is employee or IC? If he is IC, the work begins sm
when he gets to the location site. Could he choose to take his own vehicle but then it would be his gas too. I think you should let your son be grown up and butt out. If he is old enough for a job, he is old enough to decide and handle his own situations. Don't know of any construction, manual labor jobs that pay travel time. it comes with the business. how many jobs do you know that you can "clock in" before you reach your destination?
They're not thrown to the dogs when they had no work to begin with!
nm
Life begins at 50!
My kids are grown, gone & happy.
My second husband is absolutely my best friend.
I have an exciting and highly rewarding job in the MT industry, where I am a valuable member ot the team.
Okay...two out of three ain't bad. 
If the owner's name begins with a L, then she's sm
okay. I worked for a company out of Florida called Mediscript Inc a year or so ago and she was real nice. Email me if you like.
It begins with a T and the line
count they want per pay period is the same. Are you transcribing or doing VR? If it's the same company and you're transcribing, I hope someone told you that you won't be transcribing for long, and when they switch you to VR, you'll only make roughly half the money (unless you were one of the lucky ones who just started who gets an hourly salary plus instant PTO.) Everyone has to make their own decisions. My problem wasn't with doing the work. My problem was with the constant cherry picking going on and I got to the point where I couldn't take it any more.
Yes, it begins with a "T" but don't know what you mean by "the line" (see msg)
Yes, that is how I quit, just couldn't take the crap software for one more minute. I had heard VR was coming, and there was no way, Jose, I was planning on editing any Indians. My friends who are still there, some are editing, and are making less than half of what they made transcribing. Boy am I glad I got out of there. Now work for a company with a great platform, and they don't offshore.
You will, promise!
Know that we ALL were there at one time. I remember at my first acute care job at a hospital being so frustrated about asking the experienced ladies for help, that I just sat and put my face in my hands and cried a little out of sheer frustration. I can't imagine starting out at home as an MT, but it seems some of these schools prepare you new ladies well. Kudos to you! Keep on truckin'.
I promise this will help
if you do it regularly!! ... Pinpoint which muscles/tendons are involved and massage, massage, massage!! Also press and hold the trigger points--can tell those by the high pain level--for a few seconds and then on/off in different rhythms. It works, but you have to do it a lot when once it has gotten out of hand. Don't get your pain level (during massage/pressing) higher than an 8/10 for very long at a time though.
Unfortunately, we should be doing this before we feel real trouble, but it is easy to neglect it.
I have trouble with my right hand getting weak with tight wrist extensors and an almost always upset infraspinatus muscle. I let them go and then have to massage myself while I proof each report. It makes a world of difference but you have to be diligent.
We also should be taking extra care of our midback to occiput areas as well.
Lie on the floor with a tennis ball in your palm and put it under the knobs in the occiput area (at different angles) sometime ... ouch!! Mine hurt like heck on both sides, and when they are extra tight the pain goes all the way around to the front of my head. I can only stand to hold it in one spot for a few seconds.
It really works and if done before it is too late will prevent surgery.
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nope, company i was referring to begins with a P. maybe it is more common than we realize! nm
;
Yes, I think it is a responsibility and I mad a promise...
to mom to not ever put her in a nursing home as a young 20-something. As an only child, I followed and kept that promise.
I cared for her for 6 years. It should have been more but I didn't realize she was going downhill so fast. I was very stressed out in her later years as she started to develop a lot of problems including memory problems, but when I look back, I would NEVER, EVER, change my mind. She was happy here with us and although she was having a lot of problems, the only thing I wished for was for her to be comfortable and happy. (She was in a nursing home temporarily for 2 months after she broke her hip and was very unhappy. This was sort of a test to see if she would like it, but she didn't.) I did everything necessary to make her comfortable in her last years.
It was hard, but I kept my promise even though every doctor told me to put her in a nursing home. Thank heavens, I worked for a great company that understood and allowed me to take as many breaks/days off as I needed to care for her. I would never have changed a thing even though I got very worn out during the end myself because she was almost totally bedridden. Still, I loved my mother with all my heart and still miss her even though she died 6 years ago.
I only hope my children would do the same for me unless i have Alzheimer disease. If a parent is unhappy at a nursing home, by all means do what is necessary to make their last days happy. After all, they raised us, and we should return that love.
You need to be patient, be a nurse, doctor, etc. for an elderly parent and if there is none, it could be very, very "unhealthy" for the parent and the child, but I feel we need to make sacrifices for our parents happiness in their later years as they sacrificed for us in our early years. After all, they are the only parents we had, andI I have NO regrets, knowing I did the best I could for her.
Sorry to ramble. I'm still grieving. I wanted her to live to be 100 if possible.We were really close all our lives.
Nope, I promise you I'm not.
I asked all the right questions before I was hired, so I understood pay and everything. They have been nothing but honest and nice. It's one of the two most often recommended companies on this board, and I'll leave it at that because I doubt you'd go wrong with either. But do make sure you ask about everything that is important to you so you aren't disappointed.
How do these companies get away with this when they promise
nm
Check out MQ - they actually promise you
CRAP and that's what you get! 
I promise I will once the survey is completed....sm
I don't want to influence the results in any way so the information will be unbiased and more meaningful.
Jay
YOU are right! These companies promise the moon so they (sm)
can get the accounts and the MTs are the ones that get the bad deal. To be honest, I too, am not good with heavy ESLs but I sure try. I am also slower than most - but I sure try. There are some ESLs that really try hard and I appreciate their efforts. Then there are ESLs that are so fast and so sloppy I haven't a clue what they are saying. There are also horrible American dictators too. As the above poster said - the lack of decent courtesy is gone. Their excuse - I'm in a hurry, blah, blah, blah. Well sometimes I'm in a hurry so maybe I should stop capitalizing words, quit looking up strange words, forget punctuation. Really! Have dictators forgotten that there is a real human being transcribing his mess?
Last word on this subject, promise!
One other thing I'd like to mention is that I would have almost no problem with transcribing an ESL if I could hear them clearly! That's not to say that the doctor is not speaking loudly enough - it's that the onus is on the people choosing the systems used to record their dictation, be it that it's been re-recorded, crappy system, etc. The radiologist I referenced below would have been bearable if all the extraneous crap was not a factor, as well as the quality of the sound/speakers, etc. If you could hear clearly, you have a fairer chance of transcribing more seamlessly to make your lines per hour, etc.
Now that I'm an IC working at home, my main issue with being productive with ESLs is not hearing them clearly - I have enough experience to be able to decipher a lot just based on context (like a lot here say, have developed an ear for it), but if I can't hear it well, c'est le vie.
If you want to hold out "as long as you can" to not transcribe ESLs, that is, of course, a personal choice. Most do not have that option and have to bite the bullet. If you'll notice, most residents are of a foreign land and will be in the workforce too. Yes, you can get your own accounts with whatever physician you choose and work with them on those issues. But if you're working for an even small to large MTSO, most have ESLs. Thx!
Candidates are always going to promise big things
in the heat of the race; then when they are elected and start to serve, all of a sudden their hands are tied! Truly, though, how is one person, such as the President of the US, going to be able to implement change if he/she is,in fact, up against a hugely influential and strong population, such as the NRA (BTW, I'm neutral about the NRA...just using that group to illustrate my point).
XX,, I promise you can double that typing speed quickly SM
then triple it, and eventually quadruple it with an Expander used right. You're doing something wrong, but I assure you once you know what it is you can correct it easily and immediately start seeing the benefits having your expander do much of the typing for you.
To begin with, though, most of your increased speed is going to come NOT from inserting blocks of text standard for one dictator but rather abbreviations for the individual words, phrases, and headings you're constantly typing anyway.
For instance, I type RPSV for "reports that." It wasn't hard to remember. Variations of "report" are used constantly, so RP became report, RPS reports, RPG reporting, RPD reported. V is "that." AO is "also" for me, and F is "he", so "he also reported that" becomes FAORPDV and "he also reports that" becomes FAORSV. This is the first time I've seen those on paper; you don't memorize the long forms, just string together the constantly used short ones. Amazingly quickly your fingers remember (muscle memory?) so you don't have think about it.
Smartype is probably not the best expander but fine to start on since you have it. Later on, better programs have conversion programs that will allow you to move your abbreviations to that program.
In the meantime, go to productivitytalk.com and start reading and asking questions. If you wish, you can import a whole ready-made dictionary compiled by an MT abbreviations.
But you could also take another tack for now just as a trial. Instead of trying to use Smartype's abbreviations, if that's what you're doing, enter just a handful of your own that you can get very familiar with. I love these that I use and am happy to pass them on to anyone who wishes to try them:
Make T expand to "the"
F expand to "he"
G expand to "him"
K expand to "she"
J expand to "her"
T expand to "the"
B to "but"
Q to "who"
R to "right"
L to "left"
F to "for"
D for "and"
That's more than enough for now. If you do this, I think in a couple of days you'll be loving how a quick tap of the finger drops in all these little words so much that you'll eventually become addicted to abbreviating everything in sight--and to watching your scores on your speed tests rise and rise and rise... Best wishes.
I'm working a festival this weekend, but I promise to get those scriptures to you asap. Thanks fo
:-)
Where to begin?
Brandy,
Where do you live, most importantly? I am a mom to 3, in Georgia, and am currently homeschooling my son in kindergarten. I can give you some tips, if you want, but there is a lot, too much to post here. IF you want more info, post back and I'll give you my e-mail address or e-mail you privately.
Oh, where shall I begin. sm
The *hoopla* about offshore not being secure is absolutely a valid threat. It may have nothing to do with transmission and everything to do with the value system of another group of people though. At least three VERIFIABLE instances of offshore MTs holding medical records for hostage and at least one where the MT threatened to publish the records on the internet if she was not paid, exist. Hardly *hoopla* my dear. I seriously doubt if the CMT will ever become a mandatory credential and I seriously doubt that for several reasons. After nearly 30 years, the AAMT has fewer members now than it ever had. People are leaving in large numbers. I also have it on good authority that the test the offshore MTs take is not the same one given to US MTs. Personally, I don't put someone down for having a CMT, I just have no great real respect for it or the association. I trust I am allowed my opinion. I worked at a local hospital where the transcription supervisor was a CMT and she could not answer one blank when asked! I actually know a lot of CMTs who are not all that.
Maybe it's your attitude to begin with.
Change your tune. Be sugary sweet when you think someone is being rude to you and see what happens. Pay it forward. Give someone a smile or a kind word. Let someone in line in front of you. Just do one little nice thing per day and it will multiply. People are never rude to me. Everywhere I go, they know me by name because I take the time to be kind to them. Gas station, grocery store, bank, school, doctor's office. You might have to fake it 'til you make it, but you can change your outlook and how you perceive the world treats you. If someone is "rude" to you, blow it off. Maybe they're having a bad day and it's nothing personal.
To begin with, I would suggest
Paying for your rent/mtg, food and utilities without fail first.
I ended up in BK 13 so I can't help you with a company name but this is what I learned, food and shelter come first.
That's Why I Posted To Begin With
I didn't make the assumption that 'fast typing' was all it took. I still believe that you have to be able to type fast, but I also have 'top notch computer skills' and can learn well. I wanted to know more about training in this field because I assumed training was a necessary evil. One thing I didn't assume was that the folks on this forum were just downright rude!! Not saying you are, just most of the others that replied to my initial post. I am certainly not looking at MT as a way to pay my mortgage or put my daughter through college. Just a way to fill some free time.
Thanks for your post!
You should have a system to begin with. SM
I recommend mining the Productivity Talk forum for tips and a book such as Saving Keystrokes by Rolland. One high producer strongly recommends Easyscript Express by Levin, an old ABC-based ShortHand method that can be used with a keyboard.
When I first started with expanders, in the Ice Age seemingly, there were no forums like this to consult and I just started dropping definitions in without a good system. I've since had to redo everything a number of times as I wanted my Expander to do more and more for me.
As time goes on, you'll also want to abbreviate EVERYTHING for you, which requires system, both because you can't possibly remember thousands of abbreviations but remembering a few rules is easy AND because you need to have a way to enter various terms that seemingly need the same letters.
One tip just to jump you off: Some systems start two-word phrases with the first two letters of the first word and the first two or three of a second word. However, if you look up "lesions," say, in a medical dictionary, you'll see immediately that starting with three letters of the describing/adjective word and two of the noun (i.e., cocle for cochlear lesion and corle for cortical lesion) would serve you much better. Although if you gaze over just at the ones that start with intra- you'll realize more system than that is going to be needed for more complex terms. I personally start that prefix with "ia" to differentiate from ones that start with inter- "ie". Best wishes.
ADD vs. MT - Let the Battle Begin
Have you tried setting a timer for 20-30 minutes, then giving yourself permission to get up from the desk (setting the timer again for 10 minutes or so), wander around, surf the web a little (on a different computer if you can, it will help keep the surfing bug separate from the MT'ing bug), then when the timer goes off again, go back and set it again for 20-30 minutes and start typing again?
These days, I'm working in bed from a laptop due to back and wrist issues that don't play well with conventional desks, but in some ways that actually helps keep me focused, because it's such a pain in the neck to get up and walk away... I still struggle with wanting to surf while typing though - a problem I never dreamed of having back when my shiny new computer was an IBM PS2 or something like that - where the floppy drive held less information than my cell phone does today!
Good luck!
Does it have 3 letters, begin with an M?
If so, I'm there too...Ain't life grand???
The one time I asked for one, they said no. Ask and if they say no, begin looking elsewhere.
dd
The rules for Op notes are a little different. You may begin a....sm
sentence with a numeral; so, you would never spell out cc for blood loss, IV fluids, urine output etc. In the indications section, if a sentence starts with a number e.g. "Three days ago the patient" or "One day prior to surgery, I spell out the number. Otherwise, in the body of the report or in the headings, I use the number.
Don't get excited. You should have provided it to begin with. nm
x
The head set worked to begin with so
if it was in the wrong hole would it have worked in the beginning? Because it worked until I downloaded the pedal software.
How do you begin to come up with a line rate..
to pitch to a new account? Been working for others as an IC, now contemplating approaching an account on my own. No clue how to not hang myself and selling out at too low of a rate vs giving a quote that's too high and will make them back off quick. Would it be a good "rule of thumb" to take what you make as an IC on someone else's accounts and add .05cpl? From what little I've gathered over time, that's about the ballpark of what the MTSO gets paid per line for the account vs what the IC gets paid to do the typing. Does this sound about right to those of you who have experience with this? Tks
Nope. It was a small account to begin with.
The work never went anywhere. The company has not lost contracts. I'm not being "phased out" either. The workload simply doesn't suit my needs any longer. I can do it in my sleep, so I'd like more work that's more challenging.
I would never begin a sentence with an abbreviation, for one thing. nm
x
I begin my day, every day, with a nice 2 to 3 mile walk with
This gives me time to think, alone time, fresh air and of course exercise. I love to walk and it seems that since I began doing this I am less stressed out. Have you had your thyroid checked??? Just wondering if that could possibly cause hair loss. I wish you the best.
Was taught in my program that all those eye words begin with
s
That is assuming they could even understand the dictation to begin with.
I would love to see the doctors having to listen to dictation.
Utilize the speed typing engines and begin
storing in their favorite phrases so that a few letters will bring them up. I am working for several physicians. Took me a few months to get all the words into speed typing mode but now that I have, the time I spend typing is cut in half.
Never type a word larger than 4 letters.
chest pain - cp
pneumonia - pnea
atelectasis or infiltrate - aoi
so on and so on - whatever works for you. This is how to make money these days, high production. And the speed typing engines lessen change of typos and other erros.
Okay. Where do I begin? I need some advice! My husband is in real estate. sm
He owns 5 houses (rents 4), and just closed on a house on Friday that he needs to "flip" really quick! Basically, it's a 30,000 profit IF he sells it quick! We've never bought a house to flip before, but have purchased them for rental property and to gain the equity. Okay. I'm spoiled. Very spoiled. Or you could call it blessed! We are both Christians with good jobs. I only work part-time and then we live off of his salary and the 700 we make in rent that is extra after paying ALL the mortgages. But we are in a real bind now. We have renters who owe us 2 months of rent, well now 3 months of rent! They won't take our calls, you know the rest of the story! This house that my husband bought on Friday cost us ALL of our cash because we had to put some down and then pay closing costs (close to 4,000!). So now, for the first time, we are broke (NO cash flow whatsoever now). And I'm struggling over here! I mean, we can't even go and get ice cream tonight. I'm really questioning our decision to purchase this house.
See, we had no idea UNTIL closing (honest to God), just how much it was going to cost! So, we couldn't back out of it. We were thinking 2000 on the high end. I completely flipped out when the attorney told us how much we needed to write a check for!!!!
We've gotten a couple of calls on the house, but obviously no takers. My husband went straight from the attorney's office to the house to put up for sale signs in the yard! It's a cute house. We just need someone to buy it ASAP!
So, if you've ever wanted to meet the people on the Carlton Sheets infomercial - here we are!!! yes, we've made a lot of money in real estate, but there are huge, gigantic RISKS! You could go for the gutso (like we did and buy all these houses) and you could lot a lot if it doesn't work out. The loan we got on this new house is a type of loan I've never heard of before. It's just a "quick" loan where you need to pay it back pretty quick in the hopes that you will make the 30,000 in equity that the house did appraise for.
What do you do on a budget? What do you do when you are so broke you can't even buy ice cream for the kids? I want to cry now, even though I know some of you out there have zero sympathy for crazy folks like us...Well, I need some ideas on food. What's cheap to make and cook? I put 30.00 in my SUV last night and that will have to last me until the 15th!
To all of you who struggle every week like this, my heart goes out to you. It truly does. Now I know what it feels like to live in desperate need every day.....
I get my work from an FTP site that they load the work to, however I don't have pool work so to
speak, but I tell them how many minutes a day I want. The work is generally put in my box by 5 pm every day, then I have until 10 am the following day for some priority work, or 3:30 pm for the rest, so TAT is not too bad. I would like to work less at night though, but I working on that. My downside is I do not get the same dictators day to day, there are a few I do on a semi-regular basis though, some generate great lines but take longer to do that other doc's and are not "money-makers", I also do not get paid for spaces so that hurts a bit too. This is WP5.1 too.....so very antiquated but that is what the hospital uses, so not much choice there. But I understand what you mean about the C-phone. I was just doing another job with C-phone recently...they incidentally did not tell me how to get off of the system, which was very simple. I'd finish a job, then hit stop and hangup if I wanted to get off or quit working. That is what you need to do if you want to sleep, eat, etc. Don't feel guilty, do what you signed up for, believe me they watch the pools and will get others to do the work you don't finish. If they get on your case remind them that you are only PT and only want 500 lines a day, etc. It's not worth killing yourself over. Good Luck. 
You go by your schedule and have no work. Everytime I get on to work, there is always work.
x
Then you would have no life at all except work, work, work if you did that. I wouldn't do it. nm
.
Same thing with nationals. You work all the time to keep the account caught up when others dont work
and then when they decide to put a whole lot of extra people on your accounts and run you out they could care less about how much you worked.
Have a hospital I work for and they consistently change work types and do line counts. (sm)
Management just doesn't understand in order to crank out the work you need to be proficient by typing the same accounts. Go figure, they just don't get it ??
Usually work "live" on a Cphone, while connected. There are ways to record & work off line, bu
s
steady work...gearing up to start new account....but there was no work on Tues as it was a holiday
Be patient with your eyes open....
I work for Warminster at MQ and I am sick to death of being jerked around with no work all the time.
I would like a job where I can depend on the work and it does not seem to be in this office of MQ.
Speaking of offshoring MT work, who does not directly send work offshore?
Just curious. Has anyone got a list of companies who do not send work offshore? Precyse? MQ? Spheris?
Becky you work in a great place. With no one hovering, I bet you get a lot more work done w/o agoniz
wants what. The only people qualified to do QA on my reports are the dictating doctors and the rest is just pure waste of money and time. If I have a question fine. But this random QA bites and hurts everyone. BTW, I don't have random QA for those who seem to think I may have an ax to grind. No dog in this fight. Just common sense.
Good. Why dont you send some our way. What office do you work for so I can call and get your work.
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