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Serving Over 20,000 US Medical Transcriptionists

On-Line course recommendation

Posted By: Teresa on 2006-01-31
In Reply to: #1 is M-TEC, #2 Andrews, and #3 is... - IHMT

I am graduate of Career Step and I felt that the program was very good. Although, nothig can prepare you for "hearing" the words correctly. The only thing I qould tell you is to find someone that is a Transcriptionist and really listen ALOT to the dictation. As far as the job market: There are alot of jobs..... for people with alot of experience. I am working for free right now and I am about to try to get a job doing what I used to do. Dental Assisting. Either that or finish my Respiratory Therapy degree.

Good Luck to you in whatever you choose to do.


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My recommendation
It sounds like maybe you need a little boost of confidence technically. Your local community college, library, etc., will offer basic computer courses.
My recommendation - sm
J.K Lasser's Small Business tax guide.  It explains deductibles in plain English and gives you all the details on how you are or are not eligible for the deduction etc.  I have used it many times over and have found many deductions I didn't know about.  I also have the 1001 deductions and tax breaks for personal deductions....very nice.  (As an IC I end up paying less than i would as an employee after deductions)
Recommendation

I would highly recommend not going with book form but to the electronic form.  It is so much better and so time saving.  I use Quick-Look Electronic.  You can order it on Stedman's site or you might try E-Bay.


passing along a recommendation

My husband learned from an associate of a program called Ewido, that is supposed to beat the pants off all other spyware products. I tried it against others on my system:  Spy Sweeper, Spy Bot, and Spy Blaster. Ran all three first and then put Ewido through the paces. Ewido still found 7 more infected areas before it removed them.

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Monitor recommendation
My monitor is starting to go, and I have to replace it. Anyone have any recommendations? I'm considering a flat-screen to better maximize my limited desk space. Anyone use one?
I second that recommendation. also, no itch. nm
nm
I do have a recommendation. The Phillips comes with the ability

to download twice and I would make sure I set that up.  Download to the file that will be coming to you.  Then use the backup download to a file that is totally separate.  I call it backupvoicefiles.  I have found files in the backupvoicefiles that for some reason didn't come to me in the regular file. They would have been lost if I didn't know to check this. Phillips has no explanation for why this happens. I have been most happy with the Phillips equipment especially since I figured this part out. When the girls are looking for work that he claims that dictates and I have not transcribed, I know the approximate numbers to check and have them go into the backupvoicefile folder and check to see if it is there.


Good luck.  My doctors love the Phillips better than they did the Olympus and much fewer problems.


Canada pharmacy recommendation

I've personally used this pharmacy in Canada by mail and they have been great.


 


Thank you for the Koss headphone recommendation sm
I had to get another pair because think my $45 pair is dying and I can't afford another pair...and 2 new keyboards, a new mouse, a space heater, a special MT pedal and some software this month.

I was at Wally's and they had one type of Koss headphones only costing $5 and I bought them. I really like them and they are quiet. They even came with an extra pair of padded foam thingys for the ear part.

So, to all who said try them, I have and many thanks.
I switched to Dvorak quite a while ago. My recommendation
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All I did was switch my keyboard driver over and print out the Dvorak layout to post beside my monitor. I didn't get stickers or anything. I do have an ergo Dvorak keyboard now though.
Does anyone have recommendation of a good treadmill? My cheap one..sm
just threw me off for the second time in about a month (the belt slips when going over 2.6 MPH).  I have treadmill burns down both shins, one hand and an ugly bruise.  I was not able to grab the "safety cord" in time to shut if off.  I know good ones are quite expensive and have looked on Consumer Reports but would like to have personal recommendations if possible.  TIA!
I recommended it and I stand by taht recommendation (sm)

The previous version (2002) still has some valuable information and the newest version, 2008, came out at the end of April/first part of May.  Not sure if you can get it on amazon.com but you can get it from their publisher rayve (google it or the book title) or you might be able to find it on half.com.


 


I got the 2002 version on interlibrary loan from my local library, read it cover to cover TWICE and it was a wealth of information!!!!  I strongly recommend this book to anyone thinking about starting out on their own.  :)


Best recommendation is chooosing an AAMT/AHDI approved course
x
I briefly talked to my uncle, who is psychiatrist, about Tater. His recommendation was to take her
to a pediatric psychiatrist for a thorough evaluation and then the appropriate referrals and/or medications can be started. There has to be an indepth evaluation why Tater is the way she is. It could be that her mother was never abusive towards her, but it could be that Tater may be showing the early signs of schizophrenic disorder and what we perceive as lies to us are realities to her. At any rate, shipping the child off may not be the best answer, but to get her the adequate help. I feel for your friend, because it is not easy to deal with a "problem child" but now Tater's Daddy and your friend are legally responsible and accountable for the child.
My number 1 recommendation is the Medical Phrase Index by Lorenzini sm
and would also recommend Stedman's Abbreviations and Labs - these are all more generic since you are doing a variety. It would be best if you could eventually get Stedman's Cardio and other specialities...but I highly recommend Medical Phrase Index for newer transcriptionists - it helped me tremendously in the beginning
I saw the "per" recommendation over at MT911, emailed my QA and never heard back ... about BOS
I had all my frequencies formatted as

q. 6h.

Then noticed they were being changed to

q.6 h.

Searched my BOS and found one ... very marginal (an exampled within antother entry) citation ...

Sure -- I want to do it the right way ... if only I could know what the "right way" was ...

It would be infinitely easier if some sort of "rationale" or reason for this-not-that were given.

Whatever.
A gross line is anything on a line is a line. A line set at 65 characters means it sm
has 1-inch margins on each side. The maximum number of characters on that line would be 65 and that includes spaces. If there is 1 character on that line it is a line.

A standard 65-character line usually consists of 65 characters with spaces unless, of course, the employer does not pay for spaces and then it would be 65-characters without spaces.
Anything on the line makes up a line even if just one letter or number. Every line of print is a
s
Gross line = each line on page counts as a line, even if it's only 1 word. nm
x
A basic recommendation for a basic expander use plan SM
If you use your Expander mainly to store text for specific doctors and their specific reports you will 1) Find it extremely difficult and expensive to change jobs (critically so, to the point of eventually feeling you can't or even leaving the field when your employer lets you go) and 2) as someone said, find yourself spending a whole lot of time editing your expansions to the current report.

I strongly recommend instead contacting Linda for her system, then day by day developing your expander vocabulary of INDIVIDUAL words and phrases, untied to any specific report. I can take my abbreviation for "denies any fevers, chills, or sweats" (dyfcos) to any of dozens of companies and use it for dictations of thousands of doctors. No having to change it, because I also have one for "denies fever, chills, or sweats," one for "denies having fevers, chills, or sweats," and so on and so on. As Linda says, with a system the individual abbreviations don't have to be memorized. As you can see, these terms are merely the first letters of the words in the phrase(with Y standing in for "any" instead of A because that's my abbreviation for the word "any" itself).

BTW, regarding that last, editing gets very fast when all you have to type to drop in the word "the" here and there as you cruise through is a T, "his" a G, a "that" a V, et cetera. No special reason for those letters for those words, I was just looking for a one-letter abbreviation I could cut them down to to speed up.

Hope this makes sense. Linda will understand what I mean about the extreme importance of developing an independent dictionary of expansions that will work with any dictator.
Gross line means anything on a line is counted as a line.

You can get an idea in the difference using documents you have already created, assuming you're working in Word. Simply open a document and check the properties. Click on the statistics tab and you will see the number of lines as well as characters with and without spaces. If you're currently getting paid by the line and a line is 65-characters with spaces, do the math and see how that number of lines compares with the number of lines in your stats.


One thing to keep in mind: if you have a blank line between paragraphs, instead of hitting the enter key twice, format your document to give the appearance of blank lines between paragraphs.


Gross line, also including blank lines because my line rate is so low. It all works out in the wash.
x
$.06 gross line / .70 = approximately $.0857 cents per 65 character line.

A gross line is anything on a line versus 65 gross characters per net line the other way.  You make more money working for the gross line than for the 65 gross character line, as long as the line rate's OK.


A gross line is any line with typewritten characters on it - no matter how long or SM
how short.  So your gross lines may be longer than 65 characters, but you get credit even for a line as short as "Sincerely,".  If your gross lines are not being counted that way, then you are not being counted on gross lines and are probably getting screwed.  I'd look into that if I were you.
Yes if gross line or 65 character line with spaces....Good Deal!!! nm
x
1) do you have a contract stating line counting and line rate,sm
if you look at the IRS website it's pretty clear what constitutes IC versus SE versus employee. You might want to photocopy that along with a copy of your contract with your next invoice and also put on the invoice any monies due from past invoices they "changed"...maybe catch more flies with honey than vinegar. Good luck!
New England, 16.50/hr, 8 cents a line after minimum line count..
full benefits available with general contribution by the hospital before you start paying for them, retirement, 403b, all benefits, and working at home as an employee, BUT, you have to live local to the hospital.
I changed my line to a business line, talked to a supervisor sm

at SBC, told him what I was using the service for, and got the okay to use it -- $49/month unlimited. 


I have also used The Neighborhood, and their unlimited is truly unlimited.  I also explained to them when I signed up what I was using it for and their comment was "unlimited means just that -- unlimited, no matter what."  I cannot remember how much they were, but it might be worth checking into for you.  (www.theneighborhood.com)


 


Good luck!


What is the average line/hour for a 65 character line with spaces? NM
.
Curious, do most IC's usually charge by the gross line or 65 character line?
Thank you~
it certainly is not pay worthy at 4.5 line or 3 line. I know the companies cram it down our throats
nm
That still is not a paid line rate. If your base is $0.10 per line, it will be $0.08 cpl.
Considering other companies pay 4 or 5 cents per line for VR - you are still making out.

Question about what is PAID for a line and what is BILLED for a line
Does the MTSO actually bill for headers, footers, and other things the transcriptionists are not paid for?  I worked for a company a while back and their copy of what each Transcriptionist typed the day before and our copy was a lot different, about 30% different.  Their copy was the billing copy. So, double their enhanced amount and subtract our 9 cents a line, it comes to a bigger profit than what I thought.   
What's the diff between a gross line and a 65-char line?

Mebbe just got my first OWN ACCOUNT YAY!  He said to charge him the "going rate" since I pay him that.  This could be the start, baby!  (I hope)



A gross line is any amount of characters on a line

for instance...


MEDICATIONS:


Effexor


Prevasid


 


A 65 character line without spaces is black marks on the page only and 65 w/spaces is everything... tabs, spaces, numbers, letters, bold, etc.


 


 


that should be "up .02/line" NOT up "to" .02/line. geez. nm
x

Gross line versus character line....Sm please

I am thinking of taking a job that pays by the gross line and not a 65-character line.  I have never worked this way.  Does this literally mean if there is one little word on a line you get paid for it?  I have not pinned her down on a line rate but I am just thinking I am going to be comparing apples to oranges and am wondering how to accomplish that. 


Thanks for any help!


gross-anything on line counts as line,even one word
xx
gross line is anything on a line, even just your initials. sm

spaces really don't matter in a gross line count.


 


But that's a GROSS line, not a 65 character line.
So a newbie would have no problem at all hitting 150 lines per hour.  A gross line is any line with a printed character on it.
Which is better? Gross line or 65 character line? It's
nm
I don't make 0.08/line.. I work for no less than .13/line. nm
.
IC, by line, 68-72 character spaces/line
@
I would go with the line rate. At less than 9.5 cents per line sm
I make $30 an hour.  I would never transcribe for $15 an hour, for anyone.
7.5/gross line or 10/65 char line?
Anyone have any idea which would come out to more?  TIA
A gross line may be close to 65 ch.pl but she said line
z
Anything on a line (even just initials) is considered a line.
I prefer to use the 65-character line count (including spaces).
gross line and character line
I am an IC currently doing one doctor who pays me by the hour but I will be starting another doctor soon and he will be dictating differently so I was going to charge him per line.  What is the difference of charging gross lines or per 65 character line?
Gross line is anything on a line is a line
so if there is just one character, it is a line. Font definitely makes a difference though particularly if there are true type fonts involved. That's one you have to be careful on and insist on fixed fonts.
Just do a gross line - anything on a line is a line. sm
I use Abacus - free line counting software.

The bottom line is doesnt matter what they pay if there is no work you make no money. Bottom line.
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