Medical assistant jobs had median earnings of $28, 300 in 2008. The earnings range in medical assistant careers varied between $20, 000 and $ 40, 000 in 2008, with scale of pay depending upon experience, qualifications, employer policies, and personality traits of individual workers. Major employers of those seeking medical assistant careers include general medical and surgical hospitals, educational institutions, private physicians, outpatient care centers, and offices of other health practitioners. Hospitals, in general, tend to pay the highest salaries in medical assistant jobs.
The nature of work in medical assistant jobs
The work in medical assistant careers requires a person to do both clerical and administrative work to keep medical care units running properly and freeing doctors to concentrate on work that need professional clinical attention. Depending upon the employer, the nature of work can vary in workloads as well as schedules, and may also require specialization of handling events in limited verticals. In large medical facilities, medical assistant jobs often require such specialization according to the departments people work in. Medical assistant jobs are different from the jobs of physician's assistants and are usually secretarial in nature. Almost all people in medical assistant careers spend their work-life in office environments that actively practice safe medical standards.
Types of medical assistant careers
Though the general medical assistant is the most common, medical assistant careers can be divided into a few categories depending on the nature of larger share of work handled. Common categories in medical assistant jobs include:
Administrative medical assistants: People whose principal tasks include filing, updating, and maintaining medical records of patients and their case histories. Depending on the employer, people in administrative medical assistant jobs also help patients in filling out insurance forms, and arrange for laboratory tests and hospital admissions. Medical assistants also do a big share of patient interaction in healthcare facilities and routinely handle tasks of scheduling appointments with doctors, handling medical correspondence, billing, bookkeeping, greeting visitors to healthcare facilities, and answering phone calls.
Clinical medical assistants: Depending upon local legal regulations, the jobs of clinical medical assistants include recording symptoms of ailments, preparing patients for medical examination, assigning appropriate physicians, and explaining treatment procedures to patients. Depending upon circumstances, people working in clinical medical assistant jobs may also be required to perform basic laboratory tests, sterilize equipment, instruct patients about medication and diet, change dressings and do several other duties that often overlap with the duties of physician's assistants.
Educational qualifications for medical assistant jobs
People aspiring for medical assistant careers usually undergo specialized training programs in educational institutions. Associate degrees including diploma or certificate-oriented postsecondary programs are preferred. Courses for medical assistants usually cover the basics of anatomy, medical terminology, and physiology in addition to imparting secretarial skills like recordkeeping, accounting, and insurance processing. Medical assistant programs are usually certified by either the American Association of Medical Assistants (AAMA) or Association of Medical Technologists (AMT), the only accredited bodies capable of recognizing educational programs for medical assistant jobs.
