Medical Assistant – Day to Day Job Description
What are medical assistants? Do they include nurses, aides, and caregivers? Are they even certified? What do they do?
The presence of a medical assistant is a must in every medical facility or medical office. They may perform clerical, administrative, or clinical tasks and assist professional medical practitioners in their job. They carry their job under the direction and supervision of a medical authority.
Medical assistants provide a valuable contribution to every healthcare team. Their work actually depends on the place where they were assigned and on the specialization of the practitioner. There is what you call an administrative medical assistant, clinical medical assistant, and other specialized assistants. Their work varies depending on what was designated to them.
Usually, medical assistants are found in hospitals whether public or private, offices of physicians, inpatient or outpatient facilities, and in private offices of different health practitioners. As long as the work is involved in the healthcare industry, be it in nursing centers or residential facilities, they are to be considered a medical assistant.
For medical assistants who work in the hospital and clinics, their job includes jotting down medical history reports, readying their patients for examinations and operations, taking vital signs, carrying diagnostic tests and medications, discussing various medications and nutrition do’s and don’ts of patients, preparing the laboratory and instruments needed during examinations and operations, assisting patients during surgeries or even in simple things like changing clothes, removing and cleaning of bandages, and accompanying the patients in the examination rooms. Their jobs may cover a lot of things but they execute their jobs according to the advice of the health professional.
Meanwhile, medical assistants who work in offices do the following jobs. They list schedules and appointments and sometimes remind the professional of his next activities. They arrange, organize, keep and update medical records. They do billing and requests for payment. Their job even includes managing finances. Their job requires them to be at their desks or workstations, and also includes greeting patients and smiling warmly to them to uplift their spirits. Patients need this kind of warm approach to at least reduce their health worries and make them smile.
On the other hand, medical assistants should take extra responsibilities and should work above and beyond the call of duty during emergencies. They can do their daily job and responsibilities but they have to work double time and should take extra care in cases of emergency because their job is a matter of life and death.
These medical assistants were either trained, educated on the job, or have completed a program or course. They may also have formal or informal training depending on the qualification needed by the job. Either way, every medical assistant should ensure that they do their job correctly and in a manner acceptable for the purpose. Many of us depend too much on them and sometimes we put our lives in their hands. Many times, we believe everything they say because their knowledge about health is wide scoped. And often times we rely to them in all our pains and sicknesses. All in all, these medical assistants provide an important part of our well being and health.
How Should You View Medical Assistant Employment?
Medical assistant employment will certainly go nowhere but up, just as anything medical will do. There are a number of reasons for this, but primarily this is mostly attributable to factors such as newly up-and-coming medical technology, grave troubles concerning obesity as well as diabetes, the prevention of heart disease as well heart disease itself, and most obviously the aging population.
For instance the aging population is totally unparalleled, as it has never happened before in our human history. It is said that you will feel more rapid aging in the twenty-first century than even in the last century. Interestingly enough it is going to be a global phenomenon.
Worse yet, is the fact that the phenomenon is enduring, will certainly will not return to a younger population. When everything is factored in which includes growth rates, labor force participation, life expectancy, median ages, the aging index, the parent support ratio, the survival rate, the total fertility rate and the dependency ratio all taken into consideration, there is visible proof that you are headed for the older population growing at a significantly quicker rate than the worlds total population.
The effect of that on jobs that are somewhat or directly related to medical needs, means that the demand for those individuals will be extremely high. The demand for general health care as well as specifics such as employment for medical assistants will positively surge.
We will also see a global non-participation in the labor force. This means that less and less people over the age of 65 will want to continue working, whereas in the last century it was something that older people wanted to do, whether they needed to economically or they saw it as a learning opportunity, the reasons for this are innumerable. Many evinced the thought that to keep working kept them young, but with the multitude of entertainment and things to do around the world, the older people seem to no longer see any wisdom in keeping on working.
Medical assistants will be making more money in the future as well, due to the fact that their responsibilities will also rise, as more knowledge will be needed to fulfill the duties of a medical assistant, such as the dressing of minor wounds, the taking of EKGs, sterilizing equipment, taking a patients vitals as well as drawing of blood and getting urine samples.
All of this will be in addition to maintenance of patient records, setting up appointments with specialists and testing locations, calling in the prescriptions for patients and explaining their insurance coverage for them. These responsibilities are possibly in addition to the normal office work required to keep a doctors office going, though it appears that more and more outside companies are performing transcribing work as well as accounting and billing work for medical offices.
Although at the moment there are no degrees necessary to enter any schooling to become a medical assistant, it is thought that in the future there will be some sort of degree mandated to become a medical assistant. However at the moment there are none required and the medical assistant employment field is wide open to those who wish to enter it.
