What Are the Main Responsibilities of a Medical Assistant

Do you have any idea which personnel are actually providing support and assistance to the doctors, surgeons, specialists, dentists and nurses? Who are the team members behind the quality medical services? The medical assistants! They are the certified health care workers who perform administrative and clinical tasks that keep the offices of the licensed health practitioners running smoothly.

Currently, there are more than 400,000 personnel in United States. This profession is in high demand, partly due to the multi-dimensional nature of their duties. They work in doctors’ offices, medical clinics and independent clinics associated with medical institutions such as hospitals and healthcare facilities.

However, they should not be confused with non-physician licensed healthcare practitioners, such as physician assistants, emergency medical assistants and medicine aides. Although they have the similar abbreviated credentials, they are different occupations with different educational requirements and job functions.

Now, let’s take a closer look on what medical assistants do. Basically, their duties differ depending on the medical institutions, with some of them doing solely administrative work while others are working directly with patients. The job scopes of these personnel are divided into 2 workplaces, i.e. work at the front desk and work in the back office. The typical duties for a front desk medical assistant are as follows:

Greeting patients
Secretarial work, for instance, filling up forms, drafting correspondence and converting the patients’ written charts into electronically kept data
Updating patient medical records and keeping them in good order for the physician’s perusal
Answering phone calls and making appointments
Keeping in contact with a variety of insurance companies associated with the patients
Preparing insurance forms
Calling in or faxing prescriptions
Doing basic bookkeeping in the doctors’ office, such as inventory
Ordering new supplies from vendors

On the other hand, the job duties for those who work at the back office are different. They always face with jargon terms and practical activities. They are dealing with more technical tasks as follow:

Guiding or escorting the patients into the checkup rooms
Performing all the basic routine steps like weighing the patients and measuring their heights
Taking blood pressures and temperature of the patients
Listening and questioning the patients to obtain their medical histories, vital signs, current health issues or the issues related to their visit
Assisting the doctors with medical procedures while the doctors are examining the patients
Giving injections
Drawing blood
Clarifying doctors’ instructions with patients
Explaining treatment plans to patients
Preparing a physician’s exam rooms by sterilizing medical equipments, changing bed sheet, disposing waste, etc.

For the above mentioned lists, we can see that the duties for medical assistants are focused on 5 main areas, i.e. clerical, record keeping, financial, medical and organizational. They are playing important roles in assuring that the day to day office operations are carried out smoothly and efficiently. All the tasks must be handled safely and carefully as the patients are processed in and out the medical institutions every day.

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