Wallace Said:

Is medical records and billing a good career path to try?

We Answered:

There is always a demand in the medical field. There are many online schools. I went with www.meditec.com and am very happy w/ the program. Pay depends on a lot of things... just starting out in a doctors office w/o any certification could be anywhere from $12-$15 an hour. However, with some experience, say a year, and a certification, the pay goes up quite a bit to more around $18 to $20 an hour. Have you considered also training for MT? Then you could work at home, many jobs available. Also, you could offer services for MT, coding, and billing. You use the transcribed report to code from and then that report to bill from :). It all goes hand in hand. I think your career in admin support would definitely give you the background to succeed w/ billing and coding. Coding and billing are not difficult. They are very procedural.

Randy Said:

is being a male in medical coding/records weird considering most are female?

We Answered:

Actually it is not weird at all. You have an advantage in that usally in medical records you need to be able to lift 35 pounds or 50 pounds. I forget how much but it would have caused me problems.

I teach medical billing and coding and probably 25 percent of my students are men. They do as well as the women do. So if you are interested, go for it.

You could also go into IT. In the medical field it is often known as health information management.

If you want the best money in billing and coding focus mostly on hospital coding. This is the wave of the future as the baby boomers continue to age.

Julio Said:

Do you have to go to school to file medical records?

We Answered:

Employment in the Health Information Management field is leaning more and more towards educated and credentialed individuals. This requires a degree in Heatth Information for a RHIT or Registered Health Information Technician as well as a BS in Health Information Administration or RHIA. Both of these credentials require you to sit for a national exam. You can look up more regarding the field at www.ahima.org

Grace Said:

which career makes more money? medical coding or medical records technician?

We Answered:

The Department of Labor has stats on Medical Records and Health Information Technicians which encompasses both medical coders and medical records technicians. You can read what they say about pay and growth rates. I put a link to it below. But they do say that these positions are predicted to grow much faster than the average and job prospects should be very good. Both are in the stable medical industry and people are always going to need doctors. A medical coder and biller will take medical records and apply codes to the events that happened during the visit/surgery/lab/etc. Those codes are used to apply dollar amounts to bill the patient, medicare, insurance, etc. The codes are standard across the US so you would need to learn them (luckily there is software out there that assists you on finding the correct codes). So there is training that you would need to take before most employers will hire you. There are some online training options out there. I put one below if you decide to look into this career path. I am not as familiar with medical records technicians so I am unable to give you info on that part but I hope the medical coding and billing info was helpful!

Edwin Said:

IS Medical Records Coding a good career?

We Answered:

yes and you can do it from home. just watch the type of "school" you take the training from.