Medical Assistants from Other Countries

On this highly competitive job market the one thing that opens doors is documentation of your qualifications!

Year after year medical assistants that have received their training, degree, and other course work outside the USA are entering the USA. An employer that sponsors a foreign-born person to work in the United States pays about $2,400 in application and legal fees. This employee is then the employer's responsibility for two years, unless another American company agrees to take over the terms of the sponsorship.

International Degree Equivalency

An alien coming to the United States to work as a doctor, registered nurse, occupational and physical therapist, speech language pathologist, audiologist, or any other licensed healthcare professional that is subject to health care worker certification requirements will need to have an international degree equivalency completed prior to starting their job. This may also apply to dependents who are accompanying a principal alien and who seek employment as a licensed healthcare professional in the USA. 

Foreign U.S. Immigrant Healthcare Workers:

• Commission on Graduates of Foreign Nursing Schools (CGFNS)
  Authorized to issue certificates to all 7 health care occupations
  
  
• National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy
  Authorized to issue certificates for occupational therapists
  
  
• Foreign Credentialing Commission on Physical Therapy
  Authorized to issue certificates for physical therapists

Foreign Trained Medical Assistant Immigrants

Because of the lack of regulations and absence of licensing requirements nothing is stopping immigrant medical assistants from working in the USA. However, if the medical assistant lacks the ability to speak English, or cannot translate medical terminology, or operate certain apparatuses, then even their otherwise best occupational skills will not be helpful at all! Although basic patient care, clinical techniques, and medical practice management routines may be essentially the same, different rules and regulations, as well as the language barrier will definitely be something that will make employers think twice.

Why? Because other countries have different systems, for example, Europe and Canada have a social democratic government that provides health care coverage for everybody. These countries do not have HIPAA, OSHA, or Joint Commission for the Accreditation of Health Care Organizations, so their rules and regulations are fundamentally different.

Also, their medical billing and coding, and health care insurance claims procedures are completely different. While the use of computers would be helpful, the different key commands and paperwork may still present a stumbling block to be overcome first.