Prepring for the Medical Assistant Externship

Medical assistant school graduates need skills and knowledge that prepare them to function in a real workplace, dealing with real people! Therefore, most medical assisting training programs provide their MA students with an externship experience of at least 160 hours right before taking their finals.

Purpose of The Medical Assistant Externship

The ability to perform is important! Externships provide unique learning opportunities, similar to internships to provide short practical experiences in the field. The medical assistant student works a regular schedule, one can say it is a temporary position with an emphasis on on-the-job training without pay. The medical assisting externship usually consists of:

(a) A minimum of 160 contact hours
(b) Placement in an ambulatory healthcare setting

Your Externship Experience

The medical assistant extern gets a chance to apply and solidify the multitude of skills and knowledge previously discussed and practiced in the classroom. Performance and attendance are carefully tracked by the medcal office manager and reported back to the student's school. Attendance and punctuality are indicators of reliability and professionalism.

Students Experiencing Externship Anxiety

Anxiety is a basic human emotion consisting of fear and uncertainty that typically appears when an individual perceives an event as being a threat to the ego or self-esteem (Sarason, 1988). It creates the feelings of fear, apprehension, or worry, however, anxiety is normal; it is a common emotion medical assistant students share and has nothing to do with how well they will perform at their externship site.

Although most medical assistant students have some apprehension about their externship, once started they usually find it to be a very rewarding and invaluable experience. Not only that, your externship counts as experience, so when asked during your job interview whether you have any job experience... you can say: yes, I do.

  The Purpose of the Externship

  The Externship Site

• What Medical Assistant Schools Don't Know
  
  A practicing physician tells us what doctors REALLY want in a medical assistant. Read: What Doctors Want - And Medical Assistant Schools Don't Know!
• Purpose of the Medical Assistant Externship
  
  Learn why the medical assistant externship is such an important part of the transition from being a student to becoming a qualified medical assistant professional.
• Medical Assistant Externship Site
  
  Learn why it is important for shools to carefully match medical assistants students with a suitable externship site. Sometimes their instructors will...
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  Do you know the feeling? It's time for your medical assistant final exams but your brain is firing blanks. A free library of medical assistant final exam preparation.