From Medical Transcription to Scribing?
Posted on12 August 2010.
The question has been posed to me, on more than one occasion, about the possibility of medical transcriptionists transitioning to the role of a scribe. Every time, this is the article link that gets sent to me: Modern Healthcare – Docs using scribes to ease EHR transition. (This requires a login to Modern Healthcare; registration is free.) The company being discussed in the article isScribeAmerica.
So here’s officially what I think.
On the surface, this appears to be a good job for a medical transcriptionist. I see several obstacles, however, to viewing this as the saving grace of a dying career.
Scribe candidates are college graduates, many of whom are multilingual and “highly motivated,” Pierog said. Typically, the person she is looking for to join her staff is “someone who has an intense interest in medicine and is looking to go on to something else,” quite often medical school.“It’s not hard to find scribes,” she said. “The program has a 300-person waiting list.”
The majority of the current medical transcription workforce isn’t composed of college graduates. If a college degree becomes a requirement or a preference for scribing jobs – and based on this statement by ScribeAmerica, it looks to be heading in that direction – the majority of MTs would not be candidates for these jobs.
That’s not to say it should be ruled out as an option. It’s quite possible that, given the skill set medical transcriptionists possess and how it applies to the scribing position, the preference or requirement for a college degree would be waived. The articles says that about 30% of its hires are people with secretarial backgrounds. It’s certainly worth a shot for any MT who is interested in doing this kind of work in order to transition out of medical transcription.
As usual, Julianne doesn't know what she's talking about. But long as she can spew logorrhea
og·or·rhe·a Noun /ˌlôgəˈrēə/ /ˌlägə-/
- A tendency to extreme loquacity
Web definitions
- pathologically excessive (and often incoherent) talking http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=logorrhea
- In psychology, logorrhea or logorrhoea (from Greek λογορροια, logorrhoia, "word-flux") is a communication disorder, sometimes classified as a mental illness, resulting in incoherent talkativeness. ... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logorrhea_(psychology)
- an abnormal and rapid flow of words used to compose incoherent speech. A symptom of maniacal episodes (See Bipolar Disorder). http://www.noanxiety.com/psychology-psychotherapy-glossary/terms-with-letter-l.html
- Loquaciousness, talkativeness. http://www.alphadictionary.com/articles/100_funniest_words.html
into teh interwebs, what does she care?
Tell me, JW, do you know any medical scribes?
I do.
Let me tell you about Jennifer, a delightful, poised, intelligent young woman who until recently worked as a medical scribe for a family practitioner in Eugene.
This practitioner has designed an office protocol that utilizes paraprofessionals intelligently. Once they are called into an exam room, patients are interviewed by a historian/back office assistant who enters the responses into an electronic medical documentation program.
Then the physician enters, accompanied by amanuensis Jennifer. She seats herself at the computer terminal and flashes a kind wink to the patient.
Instead of being confined to the computer, doctor is free to conduct his examination peripatetically, pausing to ask the patient a question; ask Jennifer to search for a bit of needed data; or dictate an order, prescription, referral, or patient goal. It's certainly informative for the patient, who overhears the physician's thought processes.
~~ to be continued ~~
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