Clerical Health Care Workers perform administrative tasks in a medical setting. Their responsibilities include responding phone calls and other queries, scheduling appointments, acting as a liaison between patients, doctors, and other staff, maintaining privacy and confidential medical report, keeping medical record with accuracy, guiding patients for proper treatment or preventive cure, helping for insurance reimbursement, assisting patients on rehabilitative exercises and diet control etc. In addition, these professionals oversee the overall organization of their unit and ensure it runs smoothly.
Clerical Health Care Workers can work at variety of healthcare facilities such as hospitals, nursing homes, home care centers, rehabilitation centers, doctor’s offices, group medical practices at clinics etc. They are employed in different types of positions such as administrative support worker, medical coder, medical records clerk, medical transcriptionist so on and so forth.
Educational Requirements
In order to become a Clerical Health Care Worker, the aspiring candidates need to hold at least a high school diploma. However, the students can pursue associate degree program in health, office administration or related field to find out better job opportunities. These professionals can get training either on-the-job or through vocational programs.
Clerical Health Care Workers study the coursework in anatomy, physiology, medical terminology, medical billing and coding etc.
Certification
While working as a Medical Coder, Clerical Health Care Workers need to obtain a certification from American Academy of Professional Coders (AAPC), the Board of Medical Specialty Coding (BMSC) or the Professional Association of Health Care Coding Specialists (PAHCS).
Skill Set
Apart from holding an academic qualification, Clerical Health Care Workers possess variety skills such as empathy towards patient, ability to be detail-oriented and work with compassion, high medical ethics, crisis management and problem solving abilities, highly-organized and efficient to record the data accurately, maintaining privacy and confidential report of the patient, managing multiple task at a time, effective communications and interpersonal skills, knowledge of basic computer operations etc.
Job Outlook and Salary
The job outlook for a Clerical Health Care Worker remains excellent in USA. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the growth rate for job opportunities in this profession may rise 22 per cent from 2012 to 2022. The average annual salary of a Clerical Health Care Worker was $34,970 in May 2013.