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Location: San Diego CA>Tijuana, BC>San Antonio, TX
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mhays25
A lot of tech companies are trying to streamline the medical billing process. Healthcare companies would love to cut overhead. This can be either a challenge (maybe fewer jobs in the field) or an opportunity (if you can adapt to new processes better than other people).
Medical billing process is the type of job that will likely be fully automated and taken over by artificial intelligence in the next 10 years.
Currently if you go to a large company's website like United Health Group , you will still find many jobs with titles like Medical Coder, Certified Medical Coder, Coding Quality Analyst, Medical Biller, Collections Specialist and you will see many jobs that are remote work but you will notice that many are not even here in the US as they jobs that are easy to outsource to offshore. As other's mentioned, careers come and go in cycles and this one was one that you might have been better off jumping into in the early 2000s.
I’ve done extensive research and it’s almost impossible to get a job without experience. I’m 49 and have no experience in the healthcare field. My mother keeps pushing I go to get a medical billing certification because her friends daughter (who is in his 20’s) did it and got a job right away in a hospital. The odds of that happening is rare. I told my mother that the market is saturated and I am not going to spend money on a certification I can’t use. She said I’m just making excuses and I will get a job (at my age with no experience. I feel she is wrong?
All it takes is a few policy changes with private healthcare or Medicare, and everything you learn will be obsolete. It's quite risky.
I’ve done extensive research and it’s almost impossible to get a job without experience. I’m 49 and have no experience in the healthcare field. My mother keeps pushing I go to get a medical billing certification because her friends daughter (who is in his 20’s) did it and got a job right away in a hospital. The odds of that happening is rare. I told my mother that the market is saturated and I am not going to spend money on a certification I can’t use. She said I’m just making excuses and I will get a job (at my age with no experience. I feel she is wrong?
Doing medical billing is largely accounting and clerical work. People in sales support/customer service interact with the customers and co-workers, and I can't see someone being happy switching from that to medical billing unless they hated sales and customer work.
When it comes to your career, don't discuss your plans with family, unless they are actually qualified to have a conversation about it, because you are likely to get negative remarks such as you are "just making excuses".
This reminds me of my wife. She is in her 50s now and still to this day desperately hangs on to every word of "advice" by her 85 year old mother and still thinks her advice is akin to the word of God. I often ask her why she still cares what her mother thinks, that she's grown a.. adult now and should worry about herself more than still seeking her mother's approval for any/everything.
Yes, older folks can be a great source of information but with respect to career moves, I would not heed such advice. Medical billing is a low paying, go-nowhere job that as others have said, will likely be replaced completely either by AI or through overseas/cheap labor.
I’ve done extensive research and it’s almost impossible to get a job without experience. I’m 49 and have no experience in the healthcare field. My mother keeps pushing I go to get a medical billing certification because her friends daughter (who is in his 20’s) did it and got a job right away in a hospital. The odds of that happening is rare. I told my mother that the market is saturated and I am not going to spend money on a certification I can’t use. She said I’m just making excuses and I will get a job (at my age with no experience. I feel she is wrong?
I disagree with most of the responses you received so far. I was a hospital VP who got involved with the hospital owned physician practices. The practices were losing money and the billing was a mess. We brought in a consultant to sort things out. The consultant has an associates degree from a community college, but had extensive experience in the nuts and bolts of physician billing. My sister-in-law does physician billing remotely. She worked for a surgery center that shut down. She was the only person they retained and works from home. These people all start with no experience and learn on the job. My sister-in-law had no experience and was hired by a doctor's office where she learned the business.
A good medical billing certification could get your foot in the door. Many physicians have sold their practices to health systems because they have trouble hiring and keeping people who can run this most important part of their business. One doctor who I knew went bankrupt because his practice was not billing correctly. Another doctor lost a lot of money due to embezzlement.
Healthcare changes very slowly. Don't look for AI to eliminate these jobs in the next 20 years.
I’ve done extensive research and it’s almost impossible to get a job without experience. I’m 49 and have no experience in the healthcare field. My mother keeps pushing I go to get a medical billing certification because her friends daughter (who is in his 20’s) did it and got a job right away in a hospital. The odds of that happening is rare. I told my mother that the market is saturated and I am not going to spend money on a certification I can’t use. She said I’m just making excuses and I will get a job (at my age with no experience. I feel she is wrong?
Well, I guess I would be appreciative that she was trying to help. It kind of sounds like you're making excuses instead of pounding the pavement. I may be wrong, I'm just letting you know how it seems.
Well, I guess I would be appreciative that she was trying to help. It kind of sounds like you're making excuses instead of pounding the pavement. I may be wrong, I'm just letting you know how it seems.
Questioning the wisdom of and ignoring bad advice is not making excuses. Unless you are apply for jobs in a grocery store, everything is done online. You don't even get contacted or meet them unless there is a real match for desk jobs these days.
The operative word mentioned is being GOOD at your job. Just taking a medical coding course [or even one on how to be a top salesman] still requires a lot of effort and time on your part to make a good living.
The operative word mentioned is being GOOD at your job. Just taking a medical coding course [or even one on how to be a top salesman] still requires a lot of effort and time on your part to make a good living.
But isn't that stating the obvious?
The question the OP is wondering is this a field she might be able to enter at age 49 with no experience? Her other options would appear to be another sales support/customer service job, retail, some type of medical clerical position, or teacher's aide.
A close friend whose small business in a more remote small community dwindled and died, needed income but didn't want to relocate. Having run her own business, the idea of remote work on her terms was very appealing. She didn't want to get a degree in anything, so she decided (or got lured into) a medical coding/billing certification course. Knowing her personality, that type of work didn't seem like a great fit, but the choice was obviously hers. I suspect she didn't look into it closely enough...including evaluating how much demand really existed with reasonably local medical practices. She managed to complete the coursework but couldn't seem to pass the certification exam. No idea why. She abandoned it after a couple of attempts. Quite a waste of $ and time. Eventually the writing was on the wall. Relocate somewhere with more prospects, be willing to take entry level jobs, or starve. So, she did and has complained nonstop about working for someone else ever since. At least she's got a roof and food on the table.
There's still plenty of demand for medical billing/coding. As much as everyone complains about it, the only thing the industry ever does is make it more complicated. She didn't want to do any work so she figured getting a certificate in medical coding would be a good fit.
Junior colleges are the way to go. For someone with no relevant coursework and experience they're usually about 16 month programs, including summer school. Cost is minimal, usually about 2 grand but it's work. Especially now they're online so you can work a full-time job and do school when its convenient. Newsflash: It sucks to work a full-time job and go to school. But it's convenient. Works well for CNAs who hate doing patient care as they're motivated to stop doing patient care. It's dreadfully dull work. I used to do some limited billing back when I was a pharmacy tech for a retail pharmacy. It was greatly simplified since obviously it was just billing for pills. It still sucked and everyone hated doing it. Medical coding paid more than pharm techs though so we got haphazardly trained for the limited amount of billing we did in a pharmacy rather than hire a couple people to just do billing.
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