Medical Transcriptionist Transcribe medical reports recorded by physicians and other healthcare practitioners using various electronic devices, covering office visits, emergency room visits, diagnostic imaging studies, operations, chart reviews, and final summaries. Transcribe dictated reports and translate abbreviations into fully understandable form. Edit as necessary and return reports in either printed or electronic form for review and signature, or correction.
Medical Transcriptionist is Also Know as
In different settings, Medical Transcriptionist is titled as
- Clinical Medical Transcriptionist
- Documentation Specialist
- Medical Language Specialist
- Medical Scribe
- Medical Transcriber
- Medical Transcriptionist
- Pathology Transcriptionist
- Radiology Transcriptionist
- Scribe
- Transcriptionist
Education and Training of Medical Transcriptionist
Medical Transcriptionist is categorized in Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed
Experience Required for Medical Transcriptionist
Previous work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is required for these occupations. For example, an electrician must have completed three or four years of apprenticeship or several years of vocational training, and often must have passed a licensing exam, in order to perform the job.
Education Required for Medical Transcriptionist
Most occupations in this zone require training in vocational schools, related on-the-job experience, or an associate's degree.
Degrees Related to Medical Transcriptionist
- Bachelor in Medical Transcription/Transcriptionist
- Associate Degree Courses in Medical Transcription/Transcriptionist
- Masters Degree Courses in Medical Transcription/Transcriptionist
Training Required for Medical Transcriptionist
Employees in these occupations usually need one or two years of training involving both on-the-job experience and informal training with experienced workers. A recognized apprenticeship program may be associated with these occupations.
Related Ocuupations
Some Ocuupations related to Medical Transcriptionist in different industries are
- Medical Records Specialists
- Medical Assistants
- Word Processors and Typists
- Emergency Medical Technicians
- Health Information Technologists and Medical Registrars
- Medical Secretaries and Administrative Assistants
- Pharmacy Technicians
- File Clerks
- Court Reporters and Simultaneous Captioners
- Receptionists and Information Clerks
- Emergency Medicine Physicians
- Paramedics
- Cardiologists
- Pediatric Surgeons
- Cardiovascular Technologists and Technicians
- Orthopedic Surgeons, Except Pediatric
- Phlebotomists
- Neurodiagnostic Technologists
- Radiologic Technologists and Technicians
- Diagnostic Medical Sonographers
What Do Medical Transcriptionist do?
- Transcribe dictation for a variety of medical reports, such as patient histories, physical examinations, emergency room visits, operations, chart reviews, consultation, or discharge summaries.
- Review and edit transcribed reports or dictated material for spelling, grammar, clarity, consistency, and proper medical terminology.
- Distinguish between homonyms and recognize inconsistencies and mistakes in medical terms, referring to dictionaries, drug references, and other sources on anatomy, physiology, and medicine.
- Return dictated reports in printed or electronic form for physician's review, signature, and corrections and for inclusion in patients' medical records.
- Translate medical jargon and abbreviations into their expanded forms to ensure the accuracy of patient and health care facility records.
- Identify mistakes in reports and check with doctors to obtain the correct information.
- Perform data entry and data retrieval services, providing data for inclusion in medical records and for transmission to physicians.
- Produce medical reports, correspondence, records, patient-care information, statistics, medical research, and administrative material.
- Answer inquiries concerning the progress of medical cases, within the limits of confidentiality laws.
- Set up and maintain medical files and databases, including records such as x-ray, lab, and procedure reports, medical histories, diagnostic workups, admission and discharge summaries, and clinical resumes.
- Perform a variety of clerical and office tasks, such as handling incoming and outgoing mail, completing and submitting insurance claims, typing, filing, or operating office machines.
- Decide which information should be included or excluded in reports.
- Receive patients, schedule appointments, and maintain patient records.
- Receive and screen telephone calls and visitors.
- Take dictation using shorthand, a stenotype machine, or headsets and transcribing machines.
Qualities of Good Medical Transcriptionist
- Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
- Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
- Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
- Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
- Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
- Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
- Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
- Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
- Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
- Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
- Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
- Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
- Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
- Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
- Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
- Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
- Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
- Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
- Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
- Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
- Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
- Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
- Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
- Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
- Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
- Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
- Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
- Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
- Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
- Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
- Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
- Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
- Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
- Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
- Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
- Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
- Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
- Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
- Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
- Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
- Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
- Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
- Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
- Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
- Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
- Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
- Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
- Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
- Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
- Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
Tools Used by Medical Transcriptionist
- Desktop computers
- Desktop transcribers
- Dictaphones
- Laser facsimile machines
- Laser printers
- Multi-line telephone systems
- Notebook computers
- Personal computers
- Postage meters
- Transcribing equipment
Technology Skills required for Medical Transcriptionist
- Allscripts healthcare automation software
- Boston Bar Systems Corporation Sonnet
- Bytescribe Development Company WavPlayer
- Calendar software
- Corel WordPerfect Office Suite
- Crescendo Systems Corporation MedRite-XL
- Crescendo Systems DigiScribe-XL
- Database software
- dBASE Plus
- eClinicalWorks EHR software
- Electronic medical record EMR systems
- Email software
- Emmaus MPWord
- FileMaker Pro
- g-net solutions MTP
- Healthcare common procedure coding system HCPCS
- Integrated Systems Management OmniMD
- Medical terminology databases
- MedQuist DocQment Enterprise Platform
- Microsoft Access
- Microsoft ASP.NET
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Office software
- Microsoft operating system
- Microsoft Outlook
- Microsoft PowerPoint
- Microsoft Windows
- Microsoft Word
- Narratek Smartype
- Nuance Dragon NaturallySpeaking
- Patient billing software
- PCC EHR
- Precision Data Solutions VoicePower
- Prognosis Innovation Healthcare ChartAccess
- SpectraMedi EasyFlow
- Speech recognition software
- SpeedType
- SpeedUp Trans
- Spellex AccuCount
- Spreadsheet software
- Sylvan Software Complete Medical Pharmaceutical Spell Checker
- Sylvan Software DropChute Pro
- Sylvan Software ShortCut
- Voice recognition software
- Web browser software
- Word processing software
- YouTube