Medical Assistant Workplace

Working as a Medical Assistant

Imagine being able to have a job where you get to build relationships with people and help them improve their lives. If you have ever wanted to work in the medical field, but feel that medical school to earn a doctor's degree or Registered Nurse (RN) isn’t for you, consider a career as a medical assistant. It is a job that provides the best of both worlds: work side-by-side with doctors and other licensed healthcare practitioners and build long term relationships with their patients.

A Day With the Medical Assistant

As a medical assistant, you will work mostly inside in a well-lit, clean environment, typically a medical office, or ambulatory healthcare facility. Likely, doctors and nurses assign specific routines to you and you will see to it that they get done. The common goal is that each patient receives the best care possible and keeping the attending physician on schedule, enabling them to help as many patients as possible. 

Watch this interesting video clip showing what a medical assistant's job entails and why the medical office is such an interesting, but demanding work environment.

Those wishing to become a medical assistant should arm themselves with knowledge and talk to other medical assistants already working in this field to find out where they received their training, how they landed their first job and any possible challenges and pitfalls they may have encountered.

There is a multitude of exciting career choices available in the healthcare industry, such as medical assistant, phlebotomist, medical records technician and many others. Health care provider groups, physicians and surgeons, clinics, hospitals and insurance companies everywhere are screaming for qualified medical office staff and recruiting firms are scrambling to meet their need from coast to coast.

The first step when deciding on a fitting career is to take time to assess what you do well. It's also important to explore the educational, training and career opportunities available in your particular area first. Ant there is no question: another very important consideration is what a medical assistant gets paid in your area.

Another great aspect of becoming a medical assistant is that it offers opportunity for advancement into other healthcare fields like:

Medical Laboratory Technicians or Medical Technologists; performs laboratory work to identify, diagnose, and treat diseases. They use laboratory equipment, computers to perform laboratory procedures. They may collect blood and prepare culture specimens and can earn as much as $40,000.

Medical Library Technicians; collects and organize medical information and help practitioners find the information they need for patient care, education, research, and administration.  Most of the information is now stored in electronic databases and information systems. They can earn from $25,000 to $35, 000 per year or up to $55,000 for Librarians.

Medical Records Specialist; obtains, post, and analyze medical, workload, finance, and insurance data.  They ensure that this information is properly recorded into medical records so practitioners can plan and evaluate health care provided to patients. They can earn $25,000 to $33,000. A Medical Records Administrator can earn as much as $40,000.