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Serving Over 20,000 US Medical Transcriptionists

nm is no message inside........nm

Posted By: sm is small message inside on 2005-12-27
In Reply to: What does "sm" and "nm" mean? - Renee

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Hi,

I just signed on with them. So far so good. They seem to place you where your strengths are. Good luck.:)
no message inside.........
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see message inside
They have a new platform now, which is user-friendly.  Like any new job, it takes time to learn and gain speed.  My experience with everyone has been excellent.  They are there and always willing to help you.  It's worth a try if you are willing to give them a chance.  You will get paid 3 days for training, which is also a plus!
SM, see message (inside); NM, no message (inside)
nm
sent you an email - no message inside
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But there was a message inside, so I was confused! nm
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Sorry, message too long, see inside
I meant instead of saying quit, or something equally ridiculous without addressing what she said, to prove what she said was untrue. It can't be done, it is all true. I am not flaming, but I have been there, done that, and am equally tired of reading from management, you're going to love this...., and then find out it equal $200-300 less a month. Just facts lady.
sm = see message (inside post)
nm
Thanks for the info! - No message inside
: )
PRECYSE SOLUTIONS (no message inside)
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nm=no message inside. Can't believe it's so hard to understand. nm
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Spheris India. See Message Inside.





Coimbatore has the potential to become one of the largest Medical Transcription (MT) centres outside the US due to the advantages of a large number of student population and health care knowledge available in the city, according to Mr Suresh Nair, CEO and Managing Director, Spheris India Pvt Ltd, Bangalore, and President, the Indian Medical Transcription Industry Association (IMTIA).

The Industry, which now largely depends on business from the health care institutions in the US, could also expect to secure greater business from the hospitals in India in the coming years as the health insurance business that drives the growth of the MT industry is set to gain greater acceptance among the people here, he said.

Addressing the media here, he said the MT industry in India currently employs around 20,000 people and compared with other BPO activities such as call centre jobs, the attrition rate in MT sector was less. The size of the business generated by the MT industry annually in India was estimated at $250 million that was a fraction of the global MT industry's business volume of $12 billion. In India, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Delhi were prominent centres for the MT industry but now the business is seen shifting to smaller cities such as Pune, Kochi and Coimbatore. The industry is witnessing a 50 per cent annual growth in the country.

He said though the US health care sector generated the largest volume of business for the MT industry in India, other countries such as Australia, the UK, West Asia and Singapore offered good potential. He said more than 50 per cent of the medical transcription work was done inhouse by hospitals in the US and this offered more opportunity for growth.

Mr Nair clarified that the medical transcription work was moving from the US to India not because of any cost advantage but because of the growing shortage in the availability of medical transcription personnel in the US. There was an estimated 10 per cent annual decline in transcriptionists capacity every year in the US because of retirement and inadequate number of new recruits joining the profession there.

He said it was estimated that India requires addition of 10,000 transcriptionists every year to cope with the demand. Apart from the Philippines that had traditionally competed with India for this work, others such as Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Pakistan have joined the race to get their share of the outsourcing pie. There are signs of South American nations and countries in the West Indies setting up capabilities in this field.






He said there has been a gradual migration of companies in the industry from larger cities such as Delhi, Bangalore and Hyderabad to smaller cities such as Pune, Coimbatore and Kochi in the last two or three years. In the last twelve months, three or four MT companies have moved to Coimbatore from Bangalore. Powered by the growth in broadband connectivity, there was also growing trend of transcriptionists working from home that offered tremendous employment potential to women.

Mr Nair expected Coimbatore to have 5,000 medical transciptionists in the next 18 months. Asked about the safeguards the MT companies have put in place to get their fee for the work done from clients abroad and to pay their employees here promptly, Mr T.P. Prabhakaran, CEO of Pradot Technologies Private Ltd, Bangalore, which also has a unit here, said the companies entered into contracts directly with the hospitals and also obtained part of the payment in advance. The MT companies have established their presence in the business and have strong relationship with their clients.

Mr Nair said a trained MT could earn up to Rs 10,000-Rs 12,000 a month, and this could go up to Rs 15,000-Rs 20,000 after two years of experience.




© Copyright 2000 - 2006 The Hindu Business Line


I feel for you. (long message inside)
I just recently left a job where I was getting paid hourly plus production to make a lot less. It sounds absolutely crazy, I know, but I was a stressed out basketcase. They got a new operations manager not long after I was hired who was not happy about them paying a few of us hourly. They hired a couple of people for each shift and paid them hourly because the account had a lot of downtime and very short TATs on their jobs. Bogging people down with a secondary was causing the work to go out of TAT too much, so they finally decided to try the hourly plus production thing. It was working great. We were happy, the client was happy, and all the work was getting done on time. Anyway, the new operations manager was absolutely horrible and started doing all kinds of stuff that made me feel like the hourly was going to be taken away any minute. Without that, the company didn't have enough to stay for. Each day you were hearing about more stuff happening/changing. The communication was horrible.

Anyway, my point is that you can't always go by money. No or low stress is worth a lot of money to me. I know the bills have to be paid, but your health and well being are more important than any amount of money. It was very hard for me to decide on which company to go with because I had several offers. I prayed about it and took a leap of faith that I was making the right choice this time. Only time will tell, but I feel very positive about it.

Things that should be considered in addition to pay rate per line are: Cost of insurance, paid time off, schedule offered, does the company outsource (an important issue for me), what the minimum quota is, is overtime offered/expected, and is quality as important as quantity to them. The company offering a higher line rate may cost a lot more per month/pay period for insurance, which could end up balancing out the 2 cpl. Who offers the best PTO? To me, the PTO offered says a lot about how the company treats their employees. If they expect the push, push, push for high production but never want to pay for their employees to have well-deserved time off -- I don't want to work for them. I don't like being treated like a number that doesn't have a life away from the computer. Will you be expected to work a lot of overtime or will it be on a voluntary basis? Which one offers a schedule that works best for your lifestyle. I hated working every weekend, and while it was hard, I found a company that was willing to offer me a daytime M-F shift.

Anyway, just some of my thoughts that I hope will help you in your decision. I wish you the best of luck. God bless!

Sorry this turned out to be so long. LOL I actually stopped myself and could have said a lot more - believe it or not!
hmmm, not seeing a post (?) No message inside
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NM means No Message inside post
nm
I really must work on my schmoozing skills, ya know? no message inside.
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How can a message be confidential if it posted on a public message board? nm

sm small message or see message...geesh..nm
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please don't put nm or call yourself nm if you have a message - nm means no message -sm

nm means no message.   sm means see message.   if you call yourself nm, then people might not click to read the rest of your post. 


just trying to help.


ps. if the money is there, why does that particular person's balance say zero?


I can't give you the name of the message board, but it is not a free message board (HINT). There
Monitor, I hope this post is okay.
But that could be Leave a Message or Little Message! LOL
nm
Congrats! :) SM = see message. NM (no message)

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As I mentioned before, the best thing to do would be to send a resume directly to the medical records director. If they are in need of a transcriptionist, chances are they are going to walk that resume right down to HR and have them get in touch with you for an interview. And it also lets the MR Director know that "hey, there are people in the area, and we don't have to outsource overseas or out of the hospital."

I can't say it enough - I wish I had lived in St. Louis because I would have taken the job in a heartbeat. Some people did work at home and others worked on site.
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I love the fact that there is always work (except on a few occasions around holidays, etc). I love that I can generally get an answer to a question when I ask it. I love that my pay is always on time (as the previous person said). I love that they do not outsource to India. I agree, there have been some changes, but I really love MDI.

There are some minuses too, but I have worked for a few other nationals after working at a hospital, and really, MDI is the best I have seen.
sm inside
I was in a simlar situation once.  I didn't want to burn my bridges, just in case the other job didn't work out so I told them I could not commit to full time as some personal issues came up but that I would be able to help them out 1 day a week.  They allowed me to do this, and it ended up that I went full time with them later, as I actually made more money in the long run... better dicators, etc...
Look inside for what
Rolling On The Floor Scaring The Cat Laughing My @$$ And Other
Body Parts Off.  Teresa, they may have an opening at OSi or SoftScript for you.
Thank you!!!! Please sm inside
Thanks for all the information!  Did you feel that you were able to get yourself on some sort of 'schedule'?  I just left somewhere because I had no idea from day to day when I would get work or how much and ended up waiting around all day long sometimes and either getting very little to nothing or too much at once for the TAT.  Did it seem pretty manageable?  (I would also rather work during the daytime hours...)  Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again for your help!  
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I worked for them recently (within a year). They had software changes earlier to that, so if you see negatives about technology problems, it was before that. Evidently they did have lots of problems back before they were on their current system. Still some occasional bugs.

IC only. Good accounts. Put you on one account, and you stay on that account. If you have a similar experience to mine, you won't run out of work on your account.

Software getting dated. Not written by/for MTs or with requests for MT input. Hence, you have the programmer(s) doing really strange Keystrokes that are not productivity-friendly. They fix one thing and break three others. Need to fire the programmers and invest a bit more in getting decent programmers.

Office staff--THE best, hands down. QA will leave you alone unless there's a problem. You don't get QA scores sent to you or nitpicking. You either have good quality or they'll be contacting you about it.

Hours--THE best, once again. You have a quota to get in every week, and you give them a weekend day. Other than that, you're free to get that time in when you can.
OTI is also the company in my experience that's come closest to actually treating ICs as ICs.

I have worked for many nationals, and OTI remains my best overall experience. I had to leave because of needing benefits. That's the only reason I left. I would recommend them to anybody who's got at least five years of acute care experience in the Basic 4.


See inside. sm

SoftScript pays up to 10.5 cents a line with full benefits.


JLG, I believe, pays up to 9.5 with benefits (or at least they used to). 


Be sure and watch the job boards for hospitals hiring for at home workers.  Good pay and full benefits at a great price.  Don't settle without checking all options and best of luck to you.


See inside. sm
Their ad on MTJobs says 7 to 9 cents a line. 
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I used to work for them.  Is this transcription or editing? Is the patient name not there, or are you having problems getting the template?  Is there a button with three dots near the patient info on the screen?  If the patient name is not there you need to listen first and then input the first and last name on the screen.  It is hard to know exactly where you are.  Hope this could help some.
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Pay rate - range is 0.7-0.9 depending on a lot of factors (for clinic). Includes spaces.

Flexible - for clinic and ortho - YES!!!!

Weekends - I do my Friday work on Saturday but not sure if required.

Word - some accounts yes, some no. I type in Scribe, which is Word-based and very easy.

In fact, flexible has hurt me today. I have not started yet. Queen of the game shows today!
No. Inside is what you said in your OP.
I just completed an interview process with JLG. The owner presents herself as an MT who understands our situations

You are wacked and definitely not someone that any co would want
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Then I guess Scribes/Nightingale lowering their rates (without notice) from $1.05/minute to $.80 or $.85/minute sucks even worse than I thought.
Please see inside.

This is my first time doing IC work.  I imagine it will eat up some of my profit, but I am just having my other job hold out a little more.


You only do as much as you want.  She will send an e-mail out to the P.R.N. pool of transcriptionists stating, I have 60 minutes of Dr. Mickey Mouse available.  His speciality is ENT.  It is due back by noon tomorrow (Pacific standard time).  Does anyone want all or part of this?  Then (based on whoever responds first) she will assign the work.  Let's say you want 30 minutes of it--you would e-mail her and state, May I have 30 minutes of Dr. Mickey Mouse's work?  If you're the first to ask, she will assign it to you. 


You don't have to take work...only e-mail her when you want it.  There is not that much work.  She e-mails maybe 1 to 3 times a day.  So the work volume is pretty minimal, but it is something to fill in slow periods with another job.


Hope this has been helpful.


Chickadee


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I usually get what I need.
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www.advancedtx.com
See inside.

SPi Transcription - web site is:   


http://www.spi-bpo.com/web/spi/text_page.jsp?fldr_id=199


I read some of the MT Stars archives entries that gave the impression they were now an American company. 


After reading more, you may be right.  I think they may be foreign-based.  They acquired an American-based MT company several years ago and set up their corporate office in Nashville, TN but sounds like they are still pretty much an overseas company.  Kind of confusing.  Anyway, check out the web site for more info. 


 


Oh, OK - see inside
I work for Cymed (now SPi) and no change at all as of yet.  Hopefully this will continue.
See inside.
It's an Indian company, run by (India) Indians, but they hire Americans and the accounts are American hospitals/doctors.

They have both straight transcription and voice recognition editing, I believe you have to do both. Mostly hire ICs.
What they did was ... (see inside)
Suddenly, with no warning, cut people's salary by a huge amount. I had worked there for almost 3 years, and the cut took me back to the starting pay they had given me when I was fresh out of school. This was despite being able to do absolutely any kind of work they had, plus working on weekends and holidays with no extra pay or compensation.

They were originally Scribes Data, bought out by Nightingale. We were assured absolutely nothing would change regarding the MTs with the buyout, but they lied.

I really miss some of the doctors I transcribed for there, but I couldn't take a huge cut like that, especially without notice, it was a real slap in the face, in my opinion.

I did learn an awful lot working there (acute care of all types).
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The present job may be sending you tons of work, but if they're not paying you, you're not making any money.

I would do minimal work for them, and maximum for the new place. Old place can't complain about you not working if they're not paying. And the only way to see if new place will work out is to try it.

Good luck!
Sad see inside...

First let me say I am not paid by the line, but by the report.  Secondly, my lead has been wonderful.  I keep in close communication with her.  I also let her know that if extra help is needed I am available.  I honestly feel like me keeping busy is related to the two accounts that I have as well as my lead.  I was adamant about getting a second account.


I am sorry that your best day this pay period has been 175 lines, but you really have to question the variables surrounding this.  Do you work on a large account, what about your scheduled times.  I know that with radiology, usually the doctors are very active first thing in the morning taking care of the films from the night before.  This is a good fit for me and I will continue to voice that.  Even if things were really bad, I would be ringing the phone off the hook with my lead and the office trying to get resolution.  Jumping ship is not always the answer as we change and find ourselves sinking. 


In the past I left one company that I had been with for 6 years and it took going through 3 other companies before I found one worthwhile, which was not KS.  I hope things work out for you and you can pick up more work because no one can survive on 175 lines per day.  Good luck!!!


Looking for a job? See inside, please

MTStars provides the most extensive listing of job opportunities anywhere.  Our Job Seekers forum is free and the job advertisements are usually very descriptive.


We also offer a free resume bank for you to post your resume on. 


If you have questions about a specific company, please ask here on the Company board.


Please:  Do not post job-wanted posts.  Do not ask what are good companies. 


Otherwise, you will have to search for your position through the job ads and the application process like everyone else. 


If you have questions, feel free to email me.


Goldbird


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Granted, there are many, many Americans who do not use the language properly even a little bit, but these people typically do not become MTs either!

Oh, if only this were true! Some of the work from India I have seen is MUCH better than some of the American work. Way too many poorly-trained Americans with terrible grammar skills, and many of them can't even spell grammar!
More inside ....
I know now that they pay by production and that the minimum per day is 1350.

I'd have to go in house for training but only until I'm comfortable with the system (it's a new platform for me) and they are comfortable with letting me go. The transcription manager told me it would probably only be a few days. The hospital is about 45-50 miles from my house so I'd want to come home just as soon as I could.

All their employee MTs work at home except the manager, and she has been there for I think 13 years herself.

The other thing that I didn't mention is that I have done work for this hospital before, but I usually do ops and I probably wouldn't get those from the hospital as obviously they send those out.

I guess I'm just not sure whether to jump ship now since this particular new position is open (if I could get it), or wait until I actually have no job.
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Do a search in the Company Board forum (make sure that's what is selected) for Focus and/or Focus Infomatics.  That should give you plenty of resources.


Their pay is 8 cpl standard transcription and 4 cpl edited.


Amanda


Look inside....sm
They require everybody to be at least 20 hours a week. I work 25 a week and make the 6000 minimum line count (for part time) in the 2-week pay period. I'm usually at least 1000 above that so I could probably work less than 25 hours a week and still make it. I have been working at least 30 now with extra hours during the time they need extra help, so I'm easily beyond and don't have to worry. The account instructions aren't so bad if you stick to your primary most of the time. It's just flipping back and forth that makes you pause and think it through when you come to something that you know can go either way. They are awfully picky on some things. For the demos, a lot of things fill in but not all, so you have to take some time to do that, depending on the particular account. It's not hard, just time-consuming.

It's like any job...some good...some bad...but overall it has been fine for me and I'm glad I tried it out. Of course I don't have any other national to compare it to since I've only been with local clinics before.
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1. No longer treated as professionals. **********I have never experienced this. I am always treated as a professional business owner. Maybe it is the way you carry yourself??

2. Just got offered 14.00 to 16.00 per hour to write a transcription training program for company in India. (yea, for that amount... it is not going to happen). ***********I would not accept $14-16 either. Is that the maximum you can get these days. I have been fortunate enough to have good accounts so the per-hour-figure has been good for me and others from what I hear.


3. I truly feel SOME MTs do not take the work as seriously as it was several years ago so therefore the more need for QA (added cost for companies) *********Not sure about that either. The work is now outsourced where as before it was done in the hospital, and the doctor could just pop in the department and ask for a correction (that drove me nuts but they did it). Services have to offer some sort of guarantee (second review by QA if necessary) to be competitive don't they??

4. People that work at home do not work the schedule they agree to. (this is a job).************ It is a job, but for some a subcontractor's job. That means work the hours you choose. If I agree to a schedule I'll work it, but I'm not sure what others have agreed to work and either are you. How can you presume??

5. I can't be grateful for not having to purchase clothes for work. I still have to have clothing to wear and that same clothing is what I can work in. ********Can't speak for everyone, but I am definitely not transcribing in heels :)

6. More and nmore people look at this job as a way to take care of young children at home. i.e avoid the cost of daycare, etc. Please!! It is still a job!! You have to work! **********It has been exactly that for me. I have been able to raise my children and earn a great living. I do my job so well I can do both. Sorry you feel you have not been able to or others like you could not achieve that.

7. Absolute thing worst about working at home..... there is no difference from being at work and at home. *********I don't know any other job where I could throw a load of laundry in, start the dishwasher, run an errand, or work at 3 in the morning if I could not sleep.

Sorry for the typos, but I am so tired of seeing/reading how great it is to work from home. It would be great if people took it seriously, but they do not! *********Maybe all don't take it as serious as they should, but honestly is isn't it that way everywhere?

5. ********Just my humble opinions :)



See inside please
Since when does a Transcriptionist have a college degree? Well I have had my degree for eight years now. And yes it is a degree from our local college, and yes it is in medical transcription thank you very much.
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be a high producer, be able to cover every work type on your account, be able to work more than one account -- and be very consistent in meeting line counts! My raises were for bribes to get my line counts higher. I've been on start up teams for several new accounts because of the versatility in adapting to different account specifics.

In other words, make yourself invaluable and the money will come.