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Serving Over 20,000 US Medical Transcriptionists

I worked in a physician's office as well.

Posted By: mtathome on 2006-03-14
In Reply to: I know that you are angry in this post, but you are grossly misinformed - Suzanne

Normally they get paid only a percentage of that.  If your mother has insurance she can pretty much disregard that initial bill.  The hospital my parents used also chopped off a large amount due to their fixed income.  The worst part about this system is that people with no insurance and who do not qualify for the indigent write-off have to cough up the whole thing. 


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Working for a physician's office.

I am currently working for a small company as an IC. I need some extra work and I'm thinking of trying to get hired on with a local physician's office (if I can find any that are hiring and are willing to hire someone who is a recent graduate) and was wondering how do you charge them for your work?  Is it per report, by the hour, so much per line, etc? Is there anyone out there who could give me some pointers as to how I can go about doing this? Thanks.


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This is for a physician office that uses that program. I am not familiar with it. We are trying to d
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Have you contacted the office manager, physician, etc.(?)
x
I worked at a 25 physician multispecialty

clinic as an audit clerk to the transcriptionists (counted lines by hand back when we used typewriters).  I picked up some terminology by reading clinic notes as I was counting.  I took a terminology and anatomy class and my boss let me take tapes home to practice on.  When there was an opening, I tested and got in!  I also worked for an ENT doc (who was desperate for a transcriptionist) part-time in the evenings while I was learning to transcribe. 


Could you contact your personal physician's office and ask - I am sure they get info on this all
xx
I worked in a rural physician's practice for years.
He eventually ended up joining a group.  He still has his office in the same place, but is financially part of that group.  Unless they join some sort of group/organization so that they can get group rates on lab, insurance, etc., it is really hard for them to survive.  The community lost its hospital several years ago.  You said your community has a hospital, but is it a full-service one?  Our next nearest town with a hospital is about 35 minutes away.  Now the 2 hospitals in that town each have satellite physician clinics in our little town.  When I was working for this physician, we had a total of 4 doctors in town.  Now, through these satellite clinics, we have a good number.  Before this physician joined this group he recruited numerous physicians over the years.  Unfortunately, he was not able to assure them enough of a salary and benefits to keep them.  There is simply not enough money coming into these small clinics.  They have to satisfy Medicare and insurance regulations, just like the big clinics.  The recruited physicians all eventually left for greener pastures after being actively recruited by other facilities.  One physician I remember tripled his salary when he left there. 
RMAs/CMAs usally work in physician offices as the office nurse.
x
I sure wish I worked in your office!
We hardly ever get an update, we run out of work, we never get answers to our questions, raises are few and far between.... its definitely an office to office, management to management thing! I hope MQ management reads some of these posts and get ideas on how they could make their office better and happier!
I worked at one job where the office manager would
go to the gas station on Friday afternoons to buy a case of beer for the employees.  It was his version of "corporate culture".  As the only female working there, it wasn't a great place to work anyways.  The guys told me that the only reason I got hired was because I looked good in a skirt and the office manager was going through a divorce.  My resume spoke for itself, but the comments, which got harsher after a few beers, did create a hostile work environment.
Because think of the reverse, when you worked in the office...
did you ever see the director of med rec ask doctors to dictate their old stuff, so there would be enough work for MTs? when we were low on work in the hospital,a deficiency list would be sent out, and then boom a bunch of dictation...

hospitals are doing anything and everything they can to cut costs, even as mentioned above, hiring ICs on the side. health care is purely a business now, and I would bet not a day goes by every hospital in America asks the question, how can we cut back on the cost of dictation?

if that were not true, you would not have the HUGE push for the technology and the HUGE push for outsourcing, overseas or not.

think about this, also. we are only working at home for these companies, because hospitals decided it would be cheaper than paying health benefits for full-time MTs, office space, etc etc.

I do not put anything past people who are 100% money-driven these days.

you do make a great point, though, about the billing and DRGs, etc., but I still think they are told to 'cool-it' whenever they can...
I'm poorer than when I worked an office MT job, but - (s/m)
- I'll probably live longer, too! My blood pressure has dropped 20 points (for real!) since I stopped having to deal with the annoying little "management clique" at my old job. I've also lost 10 pounds, mainly because now I only eat when I'm hungry, (usally while still working, so it's a fast meal), and not because I'm ticked off, or because I want to get away from the office. So I'm definitely eating less. If I need to run a quick errand in the middle of the day, I don't have to drive like a maniac and nearly wreck my car (or anyone else's) worrying about getting back to my desk at a certain time. I just work later at night.

It's not that I agree with what most employers think MT is worth, but I made a conscious choice to get out of the rat-race and the back-stabbing office politics, and live a saner, quieter life. Meanwhile, I'm dealing with the added poverty by clipping more coupons, buying mostly generic products, and recycling aluminum. When I start getting itchy about moving out of my crummy, low-income apartment, I just go online and see what I'd have to pay to move up to a better apartment, and it gives this one a lot more appeal. And it sure beats living in my car. ;p
Back in the days when we all worked in an office

we got this new manager who I disliked immediately.  She couldn't spell every day words, she had absolutely no background in MT and figured she was doing somebody to get the position.  We had been promised an MT as our next manager.  She said she could type 85 wpm and she believed she could handle the job - HA.  We had an MT come in to interview and test and she had to ask me how to turn on the computer and how to print the report.   They company lost the account and it closed down that office and the manager couldn't get another job and had to move back home with mom and dad.  


I had a man looking for his wife to be able to do something where they could work and travel and he said his wife had a business degree and he felt she could do the job too.   I also had an associate whose husband got fired AGAIN and she called me wanting to know how she could do what I do, like she could start tomorrow.  


I've decided I'm going to tell people I'm a medical langauge specialist from now on and when they ask me what that is I'm going to say I'm a translator.  


May I ask which office your all worked for. Sounds very familiar.
:
When I worked pathology office in a hospital
My experience was that I worked 3 times as hard for a set wage than I ever did as an MT - and in medical records as MT earned set wage plus incentive.

At pathology lab, we were responsible for getting there first thing in the morning and transcribing all the micro before 10 a.m. so the pathologists could then look at slides and dictate the gross report. Doctors tried to get the gross reports back to us by 1 p.m. -- because they had to be typed by 3 p.m. so the doctors could sign the reports, and get them back to us so we could get them sorted and in the mail before we went home. In addition, we fielded phone calls, took messages for pathologists, searched for and mailed slides when other labs requested them, provided courier coverage to transport slides and things between our lab and hospital lab in the next building, and when we had a spare minute, we entered Pap smear results from precoded sheets used by the technicians reading the Pap smears (like between 10 a.m. and noon, if we had all the micro typed)!!! Every day was hurry up and meet this 2-hour deadline, then hurry to meet the next 2-hour deadline...

I learned a lot of terminology -- but I would have to be very hungry to do it again. It is hard to describe or comprehend a pathology secretary job unless you have actually been there, done that -- you will either love it or hate it... good luck.
Started in 1979 when I was 18, worked in office at MQ while it was still
.
I worked in house in a doctor's office and it was the same for me...
and I had to answer phones, make copies, et cetera, basically was an MT/secretary...and I hated it...I am making much more money now working at home part-time...
No, I've worked in doctor's business office.
That is what the insurance company allows, not what they dictate.  Who is to tell the doctor how long he can sit and talk with his patient.  It is up to him.  True insurance companies get together to decide what is the appropriate amount for the doctor to "charge" for a service but I've literally seen where the doctor sees the patient all of 2 minutes after patient is worked up by techs, but they still get paid for that visit.
I know a lot of people it helped (I worked in a doctor's office) SM
BUT you have to really want to quit before you start it. It doesn't make you want to quit - it just helps you w/ the depression and the withdrawal symptoms that come along w/ quitting. Good luck.
I started in the file room of the urology office I worked. And I was not
going to be a file clerk for the rest of my life. I only had 2 semesters of terminology, no other professional schooling. They had a fresh from a Mayo Fellowship peds urologist coming in and needed somebody to help with the typing. First it was half file-room and half transcription. Finally he was so busy, I became full time. I was there from 1990 until 2003. I then left to free-lance and start my own business. He has since moved to Arizona and I still type for him after all these years.
Early in my career I worked for a service in the office. I gave my notice after almost two years...

with them because I got a job with a hospital that paid better and had better benefits.  I gave my notice and the office manager made my life heck for my remaining two weeks.  He gave away my desk, my chair, my transcriber (we were still transcribing cassettes back then).  I spent the next two weeks shuffled between workstations and using the crappiest equipment they had.  He also refused to give me any help on my account.  It was a huge family practice from which I would get at least seven 90 minute tapes a day from them.  Before I gave my notice, I was the lead on the account and had three other people helping.  When I gave my notice, he couldn't spare anyone to help me and I got several tapes behind.  I kept telling him I was behind and he would just say do what you can.


Long story short, he tried to stiff me on my last paycheck because he said my account was way out of turnaround time and I had cost them money.  He had told the owner of the service that I had never asked for help and that I purposefully held tapes back to screw them.  I ended up taking them to small claims court to get my money.


Some people are just ugly people that take EVERYTHING personally.  You can't win with people like that.  They are unprofessional.  I wouldn't worry about your boss' attitude.  In a couple of weeks, he'll just be a memory.


Have most people had good luck with their MQ office closing and moving to the regional office. Have
things gotten better or worse for you.
Yes, I lost mine. I upgraded the Office 2000 package to Office 2003. sm
I have over 2000 autocorrect entries and lost them all as well as my supplemental dictionary for my Stedman's spellcheck. Lots of grief!

Maybe you will be lucky and not lose anything. Good luck to you.
Might be able to rent one from an office supply or office machine repair shop
s
I gave a tin of toffee for each office and a Lia Sophia necklace to each office manager. ~nm~
x
I gave a tin of toffee for each office and a Lia Sophia necklace to each office manager. ~nm~
x
Office politics. That is why I enjoy working at home. In the office,
people are in other people business. Just mind your own business.
Can anyone suggest an office in MQ that is not run like this Amherst office. They are absolutely
pathetic. I wonder how many other MTs are in that office in the same situation.
Just DQS from my office was transferred and the rest are getting on DQS before the office closes.
:
Pay kids work around office, renovate office.
x
Per my physician....
"All the antibiotics in the world will not clear up your sinus problems because you need to dry your sinus passages out." Get those little red Sudafed tablets and take the maximum dosage for several days. Also, try avoiding dairy products to see if that's a trigger. I can't even eat Ranch, mayonnaise or gooey cheese anymore because it triggers postnasal drip with that irritated ticklish throat and cough.
This is a physician saying this
The patient was tooken to the operating room. OMG, please keep me from screaming!! Where did you go to school, or did you finish?
Get another physician
NM
Not OUR job, it is the physician's and/or
x
EMR physician
I need quick advise. I worked for 4 physicians, one used EMR (partially) the others still use tapes. The EMR physician does not like to read his dictation and the three mouse clicks to sign his documents is too much. The physician has a high school graduate opening up the notes, reading them, editing them at her discretion and then SIGNING them. I informed them that to the best of my knowledge this was 100% illegal but they are still doing it. I have been doing this for some time, but did not think the rules had changed.
see what I mean? LOL ... physical not physician...
x
Your own physician tells you that you know too much. nm
//
I saw an xray the physician had
that showed a Gator-Aid bottle up this guy's rectum. The wife wanted to know if he had accidentally sat down on it. He had to have it surgically removed. And then again, there is the one I typed on where the person was an alcoholic, had drank dog shampoo and when arriving at the ER was blowing all kinds of bubbles.
Physician Websites

Here are a couple good ones:


www.healthgrades.com


www.doctorpricing.com


The physician put his comment in
quotes and it should have been transcribed. I would get more offended about incorrect dosing of meds you hear in reports if I had the option to pick my battles, but the fact is, you are a Transcriptionist who is being paid to transcribe what the physician says. You really have to leave your personal stuff out of it. And, if you are the patient, and you are crass enough to be so rude and foul then you deserve to see it in black and white.
This sounds like an ad placed by a physician's
I cold called thinking they may consider an at-home MT, which yes they would be fine with, but they thought event $1.00 per page was pricey since the in-house MT could easily type 20 reports an hour, so they were doing the math.  They figured by my charging per line that I would make way too much. Of course, I told that person very politely that I would work for no less than $3.00 per page if that's how they were looking at it and that I charge for production.  So maybe this office expected the same thing your hospital does.  However, if you type 3 MRI reports, then you're done for with the expectation of 20-25 reports per hour.  All I can say is the hospital advertising this way must have a lot of normals and only perform plain x-rays and not any kind of special procedures or MRI/CT.
A physician shared this one

with me...


The patient was in a cute dress... (medical Transcriptionist error....)


Physician Letter

Opinions on this please:   Most of my physicians dictate where they would like new paragraphs to start in their letters to other docs.  However, I'm just starting with a new person and she didn't specify.  She told where she would like periods, quotations, etc. but she never even once dictated that there should be a new paragraph. 


 


I'm tempted to just put the breaks where they seem correct, but I'm not sure if that's the right thing to do.


Any suggestions?


Physician Finder - a useful one

you can search using different criterias, might be helpful for u ppl


use the link below


http://doctor.webmd.com/


Try the AMA Physician Finder
You can do a "sounds like" search by state, and by specialty. Somewhat tedious, but you can generally find them when all else fails.

Here's the link:

http://webapps.ama-assn.org/doctorfinder/html/patient.html
Exactly why I quit using my last physician.
I would wait close to an hour in the waiting room only to feel ignored once I got into the exam room. My doctor spent more time on the computer than he did with my exam. I finally got tired of this and changed doctors.

How do you know the physician hasn't
reported it. No, I do not believe it is our place to do so.
are you sure the physician HASNT sm
reported it? I don't think (I am quite sure) that our scope of duties does NOT involve any of that. Would be real tempting to report though wouldn't it?
Every company is different -- I worked FT for one as an employee but worked a split shift - sm
So I never took breaks. I would work 5 hours, break for about 4 hours then do another 3. Another company I worked for did not care what hours you worked (IC) but wanted a min. amount of work each day, 500 for PT and 1000 for FT-- BUT they paid you by how many lines an hour you put out, the higher the lph the higher up the scale you made per line in pay; they have since changed everyone to a flat rate with incentive. But bottom line, if you are an IC it does not matter what hours you work, though many ask for a schedule and ask you to stick to it, they just want you to meet line requirements daily, i.e. 1000 per day, 1200 per day, whatever it is.
Actually, throw out the BOS and use the physician's preference.
I learned that disc is eyes, disk is computer disk, and disc/disk for back is up to the account preferences.  The doctors do not care what some stupid AAMT BOS book says because it's THEIR notes and they aren't regulated by the AAMT.
Work hourly for physician. Need help..
I wonder if someone could tell me how they created an invoice when being paid hourly doing transcription. I tried using MP Count but it only calculates using line counts. Thanks for any help.
Then the dictating physician needs to spell it out instead
of expecting us to be psychic. I used to waste so much time at my old job trying to find the proper addresses for these yahoo CC physicians. In the meantime, the dictating physician mispronounced, didn't spell, and didn't even give a clue where the other doctor worked. I had to check the company physician list, the hospital physician directory, Anywho.com, then Google. And that was even if I could spell it properly! One physician in particular couldn't pronounce properly. He would put extra Ns and Rs throughout the name. How was I supposed to find it? And I got chewed out by QA for not being psychic enough to figure it out.