Totally understand what you're going through. Just
Posted By: Jan on 2005-11-10
In Reply to: Just need to vent ... get tired of clods who hear what I do and say "easy job." grrrr sm - long-time MT
yesterday I got this email from a friend of mine who alternates jobs between lawn maintenance and roofing. Yep, that means he is qualified.
His email copy and pasted...lol..hey.....how hard is it to get into medical transcription?
cause I've got the computer for it.....just not the in on how to do it.
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Totally understand!
I loathe ESLs. They make our jobs twice as hard as they should be. I am not an interpreter, I am an MT. I feel that anyone who wants to live and work in this country should learn the language! That doesn't apply only to doctors either.
My son has two students in his class from Venezula this year. They don't speak English AT ALL! So, the school brought in an interpreter for them. I asked the principal if those kids were being taught English. She said "no, but we have to provide an interpreter for them in their classes." I told her that my son has complained to me that it makes it hard for him to pay attention and understand the teacher when he has to hear the interpreter babbling away in Spanish to these children. Ridiculous!!
Fortunately, I have an account now that I only have 3 ESL docs and they are pretty easy to understand. But I remember those days of wanting to rip my hair out and cry from being so frustrated. I can empathize with you.
I totally understand
I have never had any problem, like I mentioned, using my dial-up either. I connect at the fastest rate (50 Kbps) most consistently and I have worked several different types of jobs, on a couple different platforms, using FTP sites, and E-mail, and while I know it takes a little longer it wasn't too the point that I felt it interfered with my production time really and I am not a patient person. :D
I could understand if there is a compatibility issue, of course, but I am not convinced that that is the problem at all with some of these companies.
If we can do the work in the alloted time, than I guess I just don't understand why we can't use dial-up (particularly when it is all we have available). Perhaps someone else can enlighten us ??? :)
I totally understand
It happens more than people would like to believe. My son has been ill his whole life and in and out of hospitals. He has no veins left for IV fluids and medications and his arms are scarred pretty bad. He had his stomach removed and was given methadone for the pain because morphine was entirely too sedating. He became very ill when we were on vacation in Florida, went to the ER, the doctor took one look at his arms, saw that he was on methadone, called the deputies and had him send to the STATE HOSPITAL and labeled him a "drug addict." He wouldn't even listen to his medical history. Once he got to the state hospital, they called immediately and said "this boy is no addict, he's ILL" and sent him right back home.
He rode there with handcuffs on in the back of a police car, crying all the way. The deputy apologized to him and told him it was only his job. We went to the hospital administrator with his records and demanded something be done about the ER doctor and he said it would be handled. This is only one of probably a couple of hundred incidents. We tried to get an attorney, going more after the licensing and not money, and not ONE would take his case.
He's had dirty dressings put back on that caused such infections he required surgery, he was discharged by one doctor while the life flight was on its way to get him - this doctor told the insurance company he was faking and wasn't sick. By the time he got to the next biggest medical center 5 hours away, he required 4 units of blood and was critically ill.
So you who made the snappy comment, you better hope you or your family never have anyone critically ill because this happens and it happens a lot and people die from it. To the poster, I applaud you for having a conscience...it's people like you I would want transcribing MY chart.
I totally understand.
We had the same issues with several companies doing our backlog and I spent hours every day fixing their dictations. Very, very frustrating.
I totally do not understand
The company we purchased CyberSynch (Digital) from also maintains FTP site. They told me they would give me FTP address and that I would be able to pull dictations from FTP site? I have never done this before and do not know much about computers other than Microsoft Word, etc.
I have all of my patient files stored on my hard drive.I have folders for each patient and in that folder I have dictations saved by date. Doctor looks at his last dictation and sometimes does not even change anything from previous (all he says is same as last time), so all I do is change the date. I do not know if this makes any sense, but I do need access to my files in order to complete dictations away from home.
I totally understand your problem and your need for help--sm
I am sorry that most just wanted to criticise or make you feel less than perfect for asking a simple question. Today was apparently a bad day for some on this board, as their ugliness in ALOT of responses to other peoples questions, not just yours, showed through. Everybody has bad days, I suppose, but alot of the responses you received, in my opinion, were totally uncalled for and just posted to cause embarressment. It just shows the small minds in some people, arrogance, egos, and negative attitudes. No wonder this world is in the shape it is in! I am glad someone saw fit to help you out, though, and gives me some hope that not ALL people are so rude. Hope you have a good and productive evening! God bless us, one and all...even the rude ones. Guess they need it more than the *good* ones do! :^)
I totally understand where you are coming from...sm
The company may not want to be announced on here. I just was curious which companies are the good ones. I have heard nothing but good about Keystrokes. I am assuming they are a good one.
I totally understand that money does not fall from the sky....sm
What I was asking was if anyone had any suggestions on how to "make" money not it fall from the sky...Good grief!
Yes, I thought that was obvious. I totally understand that too. sm
Even though I'm listening to the reports and typing them out then doing my own proofing and editing someone is having to listen to them again and correct my errors. THAT person deserves and needs to be paid as well. Not to mention the company needs to make a little profit. So even if the company is being paid say, 12cpl, after paying me and my QA I'm sure it comes out fair.
I want to thank everyone here for their advice and opinions and helping me to sort this out in my own mind. 
I think I am getting a fair wage.
Perfect. You totally understand where I am coming from. Thank you.
I will be e-mailing QA at some point in time, but I will probably be waiting until tomorrow. A good night sleep should help cool me off a little :)
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 know you're right...
I'm scared to death and that's my problem. There are no decent apartments, etc. around here and I'm starting to freak out. I know I can't be too picky, but I refuse to live in filth just to get away from him. Oh my, I know I just set off a firestorm by saying that, but can you blame me? The apts. that are based on income are nasty. I am barely making any money right now, but my eldest daughter gets SSI, so that will help. He is laughing because he knows I'm going to be broke for a while. He says if it's too bad, he'll take the kids. Oh help. I'm shooting myself in the foot here.
I don't understand what you're saying?
x
You're welcome. I don't understand why some
anyone who even slightly suggests that they aren't 400-line-per-hour 'super-typists'. We could toot our horns all we wanted (like they do) about how skilled and productive we are, and they'll say little or nothing. But suggest that you're having trouble paying bills on our peanut pay, and then they're all over ya, trying to convince you to quit.
I also dislike the way so many people here treat newbies. Yes, newbies are going to ask questions that sound silly. (They're NEWBIES! We all were newbies once, as well.) Instead of just giving them a straight answer, the 'wonder-transcriptionists' go for the jugular, and suggest that they should just quit because they can't cut it.
I also don't understand the devaluation of professional medical language specialists. Not just the medical word aspect of it, but our ability to read, write and spell in the English language. The average person can't spell worth a lick (just look at all the close-to-illiterate posts you see on the internet or in e-mails!) Most people can't even compose a simple business letter. My father was the owner of a business, and he had this incredible secretary that could do everything, and do it well. She got married and moved away, and he tried in vain to find a 'replacement'. He couldn't believe how many people walked in the door who couldn't write or speak properly, and spelling and typing skills were abysmal. He finally lucked out when she moved back into the area about a year later. Even though she was working at a different job, he hired her back at twice her former salary.
I'm appalled at some MTSOs' treatment of their workers. These are the people that produce the product they are selling - the written medical/legal record. And they sell not only their workers short by trying to underbid their competitors' prices in order to land an account, they sell themselves short, as well.
You're totally wrong.
The hospitals know exactly where their work is being done. Large facilities contracting with offshore (or US nationals who provide the offshore liason for them) do it knowingly and with one goal in mind - savings. It's unfortunate, but it's happening every day.
I completely understand what you're saying.
I totally agree that a child should be allowed to stay within the biological family if at all possible. I think it's very sad also when biological fathers might not even know of a child, find out after the birth, then have to jump through hoops to get his own child back after foster/adoptive parents become attached. I've heard of a couple of cases where that's happened. The men immediately went to bat for the children as soon as they found out the moms gave the children up. Yet, you always hear the public outcry for the foster/adoptive parents. Of course, I can empathize with their feelings, but ultimately, the father's rights were taken away. Also, you'd think the potential adoptive parents would want the child with his/her own father if possible.
Thank goodness for grandparents like you. You see so many grands picking up the kids at school, taking them shopping, etc. I often wonder if they're babysitting or actually have custody. It's so prevalent nowadays.
I understand why you're concerned. Its not
so much that you need to mind your own business in that you don't want to end up losing the account because some other dimwit MT is not following the rules. I don't know what I'd do either, but don't blame yourself and think its none of your business. It 100% is your business. Again, I have worked as an IC and lost accounts because of other MTs who just won't follow directions....so I wouldn't want to see that happen to you either. Sorry for your situation.
I understand what you're going through. I work both myself. sm
I have been IC for several years, and thought I might go back to employee for benefits. But I found the insurance was so high, and the pay was not as good, so I work both part time now. The bottom line is, I can't give up the freedom I've had in the last several years. I am given so much work in the morning, and have all day to finish it, and I love this system. I tried to set a schedule for my part-time employee job, thinking I would like to go to full time if it worked out. But I had too much trouble making myself fit a schedule (they have offered to let me work when I can, so I'm still keeping the job, but if I can't do it right, I will quit). Unfortunately, when you get used to IC, it is hard to fit back in a "box." Maybe you could look for a company that would allow you some flexibility in your schedule, say an 8-hour window to work 6 hours. If you have the experience, some companies will work with you that way. I don't think IC is a dead end, it is just a little harder to manage. But the benefits did not pan out. I can get the insurance cheaper individually, the pay was lower so I could actually put a little back as an IC every pay period and take time off "paid." The only thing I miss is what they pay for taxes (I think 7% or so), and having someone else do these things for me. If you like IC as I do, try setting up your own retirement plan, getting your own insurance, and put a little back each pay period for some time off. Good luck with your decision.
I also type ERs and understand what you're saying:-) nm
nm
You're the one who doesn't understand anything. (nm)
xx
Don't understand why you're confused
Unless you're confused about what thread you're in. You replied to my post that I don't believe it is possible to do this on 1 income. You proved my point.
I totally agree and keep in mind the quality of the dictation where you're at currently. SM
You're already used to the dictators where you're at now. I can almost guarantee that the quality of the dictation will decrease and the number of ESL will increase whatever national you choose to go to compared to where you're at now. Even if you do luck out and a get a good account at a national, there is still the transitional phase where you getting to know the dictators, account specifics, etc. and your production will decrease considerably than what you are used to.
I'd stay where you're at, choose a national that you like, one that gets more positive feedback than negative, and try it on for size.
Good Luck!
Or ask for samples of the doc's work if they're hard to understand. GI terms are
s
Totally agree. They're no longer paying for this so-called skill
and that's part of the reason the quality is down.
You're likely to make more money on the lower rate because easier to understand and can probably
faster and need less time to look things up, etc. Just my 2 cents.
I totally understand but if your husband is like my husband... sm
When it comes to something like that, that I usually take care of but for whatever reason I can't, I will tell my husband exactly what to do, but when he comes back - to use your case as a "for instance" - I will ask him, "Did the doctor look at his foot?"
Him: "No."
Me: "Did you ask the doctor to look at his foot?"
Him: "No."
Me: "I told you to have the doctor look at his foot!"
Him: (shrug)
etc., etc., etc.
Your husband may not be like that - I sure hope he isn't. And yes, they should have checked his vitals and checked his foot without being asked. But sometimes you have to be assertive with people. And while my husband attained the rank of major in the Air Force and had no trouble ordering people around, there are times when he should be assertive but isn't. And he is not intimidated by doctors - he started his AF career as an x-ray tech (that's how we met). I dunno....(Rad MT wanders off, mumbling....)
Totally Special, totally HOT! NM
z
For Pete's sake, you're not terminating a pregnancy, you're just typing a report after the
It's already been done before you even hear about it, and NOTHING changes regardless of whether you or someone else types it. Sheesh.
It's not funny when you're on a board where language is one skill you're selling.
.
Hope you're gonna have a glass of wine while you're relaxing
in your spa goodies. Congrats!
Well, you're all complaining that accounts are current and work is low, so, gee, maybe they're
focusing on WORK, as in CLIENT and transcribing, as maybe half of you should be focusing on!!
If you're experienced, try for 9cpl or higher, and you're lucky to get that! nm
s
Skip it. No one cares. Either you're good on the test or you're not.
x
You're probably right. Plus we're losing our percentage of good people by .... (sm)
allowing every loser from every 3rd world country on the planet to just stroll on into our country, some legally, most illegally, and take advantage of the social services all us hard working little gerbils pay for by having money taken out of our pay every month. But I don't think we're all lazy. Just the ones on permanent welfare driving around town in brand-new Cadillac Escalades. Saw one just today on the Bayshore Fwy. Brand-new black Escalade with expensive spinner wheels, with 5 or 6 Mexicans in it. Well, who knows - maybe they stole it and it was on its way to a chop-shop. Smart-and-hungry people aren't always hard-working and honest.
You're not going to find a word expander for free. You're going to have to pay
g
You're forgetting all the stuff you can't buy when you're UNEMPLOYED!
Unemployed people have a hard time buying anything, including cheaply made offshore products. How many will have to end up depending on public assistance? That means more tax dollars being eaten up - besides the taxes NOT being collected from the overseas workers. In the long run, are you really enjoying a lower price?
If you're on the job, ask for samples to do it how they want it. If you're testing, separate o
s
You're not losing it, you're burned out on your main job.
I feel for you... I am having my own "version" ;-) of these kinds of struggles. Lots of recent changes at the admin level have made my job do a 180, going from a really great one to a really crappy one.
For me, it's a struggle to get through the day with a shred of motivation. I get distracted in the way you discuss as well.
I just try to make my environment as comfortable as possible and make the best of it while I decide what the best way is to deal with the burnout... I figure if I can't change my inner brain workings so that I still like this job, I need to find another one, or this feeling will possibly get worse!
I hope it works out for you. Wish I had some better advice for you, but this really does look like burnout and extreme job dissatisfaction to me. We all wear it differently. Try to be good to yourself while you figure out a solution.
Don't know what you're complaint you're making with this post. sm
You stated in your original post that you don't want to work weekends or odd shifts. What is your definition of an odd shift? Second shift? Third shift? Sounds like you want to work M-F on days. Sounds kind of rigid to me. 
Personally I like second shift, so everyone working days means more work for me! 
You're not under a rock, you're just like me... an adult with more to
s
It's not because you're beautiful, it's because you're an IDIOT!
Does that make it any clearer for you??
YOU'RE A SACK OF CRAP!! YOU'RE NOT
THE ADMINISTRATOR. WHAT DO YOU THINK WE ARE IDIOTS???
 
Honey you're not being a shrew, you're being a
I don't get it when husbands and wives *allow* the other to have money that THEY work for...just don't get it. Go buy the flippin' keyboard and tell him to take a hike! (To put it sweetly!)
Why is it the only expander you're permitted to use? How would any know what you're using?
xx
They think they're smart to accept it, but they're
m
If they're withholding taxes, you're not an IC.
As an IC, you should already be paying taxes. That said, the only benefit having them withhold FICA is that your Social Security/Medicare share will be less. Social Security is 15%; if you're an employee, you pay 7.5% and your employer pays 7.5%. As an IC, you pay 15%. Doing the math, 0.0925 would be your 0.10 minus 7.5%--the 0.0924 is just a tad less than you're making now.
We're out here (good MTs) but we're busy! sm
I don't recall ever taking an employment test where I wasn't offered a job. My MTSO does not even look at my work unless I happen to have a question or a blank, which happens maybe once in every 30 or so reports with an ESL. If you find a really good MT, how much training would be involved? Certainly you would save time in the long run once they're trained and you don't have to check all their work.
If you're one of the MTDesk clan then you're ok
wersdffa
You're right if you're single it's tough.
I am an IC as well, but I have a husband with benefits and makes a fair buck. I am fortunate after 20 years to able to work from home. I worked on site for 17 years with a "chocolate cake" the day I left. Nothing more... The loyalty in any profession is gone, gone, and gone again.
Most companies want new employees/ICs that will take low pay and that won't cost much in the way of paying vacation time.
I do take every Friday off and try only to get on to check e-mail, etc.
However, I wouldn't trade being here for my kids at this point.
There are headaches no matter what profession you are in. It seems if it isn't one thing it's another.
Raises? Out of the question in this profession since most are afraid they will lose the account including myself. I also underbid my last account because I wanted the account so bad. I should be charging more.
It is a neverending cycle really.
But, I still enjoy the work, so I guess that's the difference. It does take will power to sit and type. Some people need that boss hanging around to keep the production up and the incentive of a nice paycheck is just not good enough.
Good luck with your new job! Sounds great!
If you're new, good - if you're not a newbie, not so hot
Would need to know how long you have been an MT. For a newbie, this is a pretty good rate of speed.
However, if you have anything over a couple years of experience, then this is not too hot.
Also, what are the dictators like? Is it a "United Nations" account??
If you ARE capable of 200 lph or more and you can't seem to get it, then the problem has got to be with the platform you are using. In my experience, the platform into which you transcribe can make or break your paycheck - so if the platform stinks, then I hate to tell you, but there is no way you will be able to improve your line rate. I have quit jobs because of awful platforms more than once.
You are totally right.
You are totally right. It would be nice to be paid hourly for what we are worth but that probably will not happen but it is the Transcriptionist first priority in my eyes to make sure the report is accurate before how much they produce in one particular hour. I would never just put anything because I did not know just because I wanted to make more money that hour that is why it takes experience in this business to make any real income. I know when I started out, I made more money babysitting than I did transcribing but as you gain experience there is less and less you have to look up and then you begin to make a real income.
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