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I need some advice. Does anyone here have experience or know anyone who is working from home doing medical transcription?
I'm expecting my first baby in March and my current job will end at the end of the summer because we are our losing our grant funding. I'd like to be able to stay home with my baby after my job ends in August. I've been looking into a Utah online medical transcription training company called Career Step. There are so many scams that talk about being able to work from home that I'm skeptical that this is a legitimate option. Has anyone heard anything positive or negative about Career Step?
I have an MBA but no experience in the medical field. How likely do you think it would be that I could get a SAH job after taking an online training course?
Posts: 66 | Registered: Jan 2006
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posted
If I were you, I would try a local community college, rather than the online course. Community colleges are more likely to be able to help you finding a job than an online course is, and many of them offer courses in coding and medical transcription. My local community college offers medical transcription courses, and they are only one night per week.
Posts: 1214 | Registered: Aug 2005
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I have a good friend who has done medical transcription from home for the past few years. She enjoys the flexiblity and she did her training online in Idaho.
Posts: 862 | Registered: Oct 2003
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There are at least 3 girls in our little town who paid for a similar training program. None are working in the field. There does not appear to be a market for off-site transcription or billing services except in large metro markets.
Posts: 1167 | Registered: Oct 2005
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I don't know anything about medical transcription. But if for some reason it doesn't pan out, I've heard good things about Alpine Access, a genuine stay at home part time job.
Posts: 1947 | Registered: Aug 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Vamp96: I need some advice. Does anyone here have experience or know anyone who is working from home doing medical transcription?
I'm expecting my first baby in March and my current job will end at the end of the summer because we are our losing our grant funding. I'd like to be able to stay home with my baby after my job ends in August. I've been looking into a Utah online medical transcription training company called Career Step. There are so many scams that talk about being able to work from home that I'm skeptical that this is a legitimate option. Has anyone heard anything positive or negative about Career Step?
I have an MBA but no experience in the medical field. How likely do you think it would be that I could get a SAH job after taking an online training course?
I took Career Step, actually, intending to be an MT, but ended up not pursuing that option after all. At the time, I was relying on my own income and I found out after I'd already committed a bunch of finances to the schooling that in the greater Seattle area, at least, one cannot live off the wage of a beginning MT. But if you have a second income to help out (I assume you do, but I don't know) and if your cost of living isn't as ridiculous as in Seattle, you should be absolutely fine! I ended up going for wedding photography instead, which is a bit more fun for me, but I have to say that I actually did enjoy learning about MT and I was looking forward to the career until I found out that no beginning MT can expect to make $14.50 an hour, which is about what one needs to live on one's own in a crappy apartment in the suburbs of Seattle. Although, I should point out that you can certainly get up to that point in a fairly short period of time.
As for Career Step itself, I thought it was great. I felt wonderfully prepared and very knowledgeable by the end of the training. The coursework itself was so great - really easy to work in around my work schedule. The teachers who work for Career Step are awesome - at least, the ones I had.
Yes, I think your chances of getting a SAH job out of the gate are very good. Most of my fellow students who went directly into MT got SAH jobs - most of the ones who didn't got on-site jobs because they preferred on-site jobs.
And it is a very interesting job, too. You get paid based on how much you work, so that's also a good thing for most people who are working from home.
I definitely would recommend Career Step to anybody. I stayed in touch with a lot of my "classmates" and most of them reported that employers looked very favorably on the fact that they were Career Step-trained!
Posts: 1006 | Registered: Jun 2006
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quote:Originally posted by andi330: If I were you, I would try a local community college, rather than the online course. Community colleges are more likely to be able to help you finding a job than an online course is, and many of them offer courses in coding and medical transcription. My local community college offers medical transcription courses, and they are only one night per week.
BTW, I don't know about other online courses, but Career Step is usually run through your local community college, but you have the option of taking classes in-person or via online sources. And there was an entire unit on finding work after you've finished the program. They had extensive units on certification, the pros and cons, what to expect in certification exams, etc. It was VERY thorough and informative - I was extremely impressed with the curriculum as a whole.
Posts: 1006 | Registered: Jun 2006
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Alpine Access was started by a friend of my familiy. He isn't involved anymore, but I'm on their waiting list of employees. I just need to find a schedule that doesn't interfere with my classes (very unlikely though )
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No one will get rich off of it, but for a second job, or as stay at home parent it would work fairly well, probably.
Posts: 15082 | Registered: Jul 2001
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I have a friend that did it for quite a while after online training through a local cc. I've also heard great things about Alpine but you have to have a minimum of (I think) 20 hrs/wk of available hours and during that time there has to be ZERO background noise, not so easy with kids around.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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I know someone who made $50K/yr doing MT from home and not really working full time. She'd been doing it for awhile to reach that point, but it obviously turned into some fairly decent money.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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i can see why you would be, Vamp! Although I am now paying back $7000 in student loans for my MT training, I definitely don't feel that I was scammed at all. Not becoming an MT was a personal choice, and who knows? I may become one in the future, now that I have this great education in it! Good luck to you if you decide to do it. It is an interesting career!
Posts: 1006 | Registered: Jun 2006
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Although, I should point out that you can certainly get up to that point in a fairly short period of time.![[Wink]](wink.gif)
Although I am now paying back $7000 in student loans for my MT training, I definitely don't feel that I was scammed at all. Not becoming an MT was a personal choice, and who knows? I may become one in the future, now that I have this great education in it! ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
Good luck to you if you decide to do it. It is an interesting career!
