Thanks to the criticism and the limited knowledge of medical transcription, a wannabe medical transcriptionist can find himself/herself utterly confused. In today’s post, we will try answering some of their questions.

Is the medical transcriptionist training absolutely necessary?
Yes, it is. A medical transcriptionist needs to possess a sound medical knowledge to be able to do his/her job. Anyone with the right aptitude can join the profession provided he/she undergoes a proper training in medical transcription.

Will there be enough medical transcription opportunities in the future?
The medical transcription profession is one of the few that has come out unaffected from the recession that affected the economies the world over. The US Department of Labor projects that the number of opportunities in the field will grow at a rate of 14 percent to 2016 from what it was in 2006. This rate is more than the average rate of growth of other occupations. With an ever-increasing and aging population, the demand for medical records continues to increase. Thus, the medical transcriptionist will see more opportunities in the future.

How much does the medical transcription profession pay?
You must have already heard that the medical transcription profession pays well. How much you earn depends completely on your proficiency and your experience in the field. The US Department of Labor states that the mean hourly wage of a medical transcriptionist is $15.84 and the mean annual wage is $32,960.

Is there a threat from the speech-recognition software?
The speech recognition was thought to be a serious threat to the medical transcriptionist’s job. However, with time, it has been realized that it is not capable to replace the transcriptionist. It requires doctors to spend a considerable amount of time in training and using it, beating the whole purpose of saving their valuable time. Moreover, the results delivered by the software are not accurate, requiring human intervention to edit them.

If you have more questions about the medical transcription profession, submit your question here.