4 Main Differences Between a Veterinary Technician and a Veterinary Assistant

By Rowena Fernandez

Within the veterinary career field, many often assume that the position of a veterinary technician and a veterinary assistant is the same thing. But it actually isn’t. There are many differences between these two despite how similar they may seem.

The biggest difference would be the job scope. A veterinary technician has a broad array of task and duties. They play the role of the nurse, anesthetists, and laboratory and radiology technicians. They also administer jobs and do the basic hands on work. A veterinary assistant on the other hand, serves as an extra set of hands with the daily clinical work. They help keep the surgical tables and tools clean and also handle most of the front desk work such as scheduling appointments and such. If there are overnight patients, they assist in feeding, exercising and cleaning as well.

In addition to that, another difference would be in education. As a veterinary technician you would be able to graduate within two to four years from an accredited program depending on the depth of the course. On the other hand, as a veterinary assistant, a higher education isn’t really necessary as you can just go through a short course or training program by the employer.

Furthermore, there is also a vast difference in benefits such as salaries. Although the sum of income depends on the location, a veterinary technician makes about $26,000 to $40,000 annually while a veterinary assistant make about $14,000 to about $25,000 at the most.

Also, there is a difference in job opportunities as well. As both jobs are at high demand, there is no doubt on job security. But it varies on locations. In example, a veterinary technician could work in hospitals, zoos, animal shelters, biomedical facilities and diagnostic research laboratories. Whereas a veterinary assistant is grounded to clinics, hospitals, pet stores and shelters.

In conclusion, there are many differences between veterinary technicians and veterinary assistants, aside from the 4 main ones mentioned above. So if you’ve been assuming the jobs are similar, think again.

For more information about veterinary assistant programs in your area go to http://www.BostonReedCollege.com.

Top Skills Needed To Be An Effective Medical Assistant

By Daryl B. Chapman

Nowadays many are enticed to get into the medical assisting career. This is because the medical industry is rapidly expanding and growing that it needs a lot of healthcare assistants to sustain people’s medical needs. Another reason why people pursue this kind of career is because the program course is very easy and convenient. It only takes six months to one year to finish the entire course. Furthermore, students can conveniently enroll online. People use this kind of healthcare career as a stepping stone if they want to pursue medical career or administrative career. A lot of them enroll in this kind of career to finance their education in medicine or other administrative courses.

Contrary to how easy and comfortable finishing its trainings and program courses, the duties and responsibilities of being a medical assistant (MA) is a daunting task. There are skills that one must master in order to be well equipped in this line of work. They cover a wide scope of work from administrative tasks to clinical tasks. These are:

– Filing paperwork, lab slips, insurance forms and billing statements.
– Retrieving and reviewing patient’s medications and medical history, complaints if any and interrogation of patient’s complaints.
– Stocking and purchasing of office and medical supplies.
– Coding medical and office supplies and procedures.
– Answering telephone calls, arranging doctor’s schedules.
– Greeting and interviewing patients.
– Participating in training of aspiring assistants
– Helping doctors examine and treat patients.
– Drawing of blood
– Checking of height, weight, temperature and blood pressure of the patients
– Preparing and administering medications, instructing patients in taking medications
– Changing the patients dressings
– Removing sutures
– Acting as the doctor’s liaison
– Keeping the patients feel at home and comfortable in the hospital

The above mentioned tasks are only a few from the massive duties and responsibilities of medical assistants. To be able to fulfill these tasks, an aspiring assistants must possess these following skills:

Administrative skills – Medical assistants will do a lot of administrative tasks and one should possess skills on this area. Medical assistant should have skills on keeping the files organized and intact. Moreover, it is advisable to have skills on bookkeeping as well because handling finance records are included in their tasks.

Clinical skills – This is one major skill that a MA should posses. Clinical skills are gained through hands-on training and practical experience. During program courses, a lot of lessons are taught such as anatomy, physiology, medical ethics and terminology but these are just theories and should be put into practice before a student will be able to gain skills on these areas. For instance, giving patients medicines through injections, theory is not enough to be able to master it. Medical assistants should experience performing injections to patients with direct supervision of a licensed health care provider.

Good communication skills – Medical assistants are also responsible for keeping the patients feel at home and comfortable, they should possess good communication skills. They are the ones who answer phone calls and sometimes explain the procedures that are being done to the patients. With that said, they should know how to communicate not only to patients but to the other medical staffs in the hospital as well. They should have the ability to converse clearly, concisely, precisely and calmly most especially in emergency situations.

Indeed medical assisting is very in demand these days. It is very easy to finish trainings and program courses and very effortless to find a job. They have so many duties and responsibilities and without the right skills, one will not be able to fulfill these enormous and daunting tasks.

Learn more about Medical Assisting now! 

Health Information Technician: Career Profile and Job Outlook

Would you like to work in the health care field in an administrative role? Are you interested in data analysis? If so, read on to find out more about a career as a health information technician!

What are the Duties of a Health Information Technician?

As a health information technician, you gather patient data, evaluate its accuracy, and organize the data to make it easily accessible to patients, doctors and insurance companies. Medical history, symptom information, test results, diagnoses and related data make up the vast archive of information in a patient’s medical record. You may assess medical records for completeness and correspond with other medical professionals to obtain extra information as needed.

Because most technicians are employed in a hospital setting, you will need to become increasingly familiar with electronic health care records, which are beginning to be used with more and more frequency. Additionally, there are several specialty areas within the health information technician field, such as cancer registry and health information coding.

What Is My Occupational Outlook?

Employment opportunities in the health information technician field are excellent. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), there were 172,600 technicians employed as of 2008; the number of available positions was expected to increase to 207,600 by 2018 (http://www.bls.gov). This is an estimated growth rate of 20% and is faster than the national average for all professions. The growth in this field is due to insurance companies demanding that medical treatments become more scrutinized and health information technicians having to keep more accurate and detailed records.

Click here to learn more about this in-demand profession!

Check out Hot Careers in Healthcare for more information about this exciting opportunity . Register today!

Deciding to Start a New Career in Allied Health

By Erik R. Johnson

The term ‘allied health’ is generally used to indicate a cluster of health care professions that covers more than 100 occupational titles, exclusive of physicians, nurses, and a handful of others. Generally, this profession is categorized into two broad categories, mainly – therapists/technologists and technicians (assistants). While technicians perform their duties under the direction of therapists and their education takes less than two years, the educational course of technologists on another hand is more strenuous and their responsibilities primarily revolve around technical skills. They are actually the key personnel who play a vital role in identifying the grounds behind different healing methods that can help them in evaluating the side effects of any therapeutic procedure.

Today allied health is one of the few professions that offer enough room and ample opportunities for career advancement. Talking about the scope of this profession, there are some of the most promising statistics that certainly define the growing popularity of this profession. In fact, it is estimated that there are near about 5 million allied health care professionals who are working in more than 80 different professions. Adding to this, as per the recent study made by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, it is expected that in the next few years almost 36% more health care professionals will be required in the allied health fields. All these facts and studies clearly indicate about the rising demand for allied health workers.

These days, there are even many specialized areas in health care that have been very little to do with being a doctor or a nurse. The key point to note is that these careers like Recreational Therapist, Clinical Laboratory Technicians, Health Information Technician and many more suitably fall into the allied health class and collectively make the health care system succeed. Perhaps, looking at the current situation, it won’t be wrong to state that this field in health care is varied and there is something for just about everyone. However, if we talk in terms of salary then the salary in this field differs largely depending on the kind of employment setting, years of experience, region of the country, occupancy and designation.

Apart from this, the greatest reward of a job in this field is that it is one of the few professions that actually allow you to bring a positive health change directly, which can be both empowering and satisfying as well. At times the change can be immediate, or even the one with the lasting result, but depending on your area of expertise, it can offer a variety of opportunities and avenues in which you wish to practice. It is one of the few fields that can bring a difference to not just your life but other life as well. So, by now if you have made up your mind and planning for making a career in this allied health care field then to get started all you need is the right training from a reputable school.

An allied health care education can help you develop your talents and knowledge in the areas in which you are planning to work. In addition to this, the program supports you, through supervision that further ensures the progress of a personalized learning plan. Contact us today to learn how you can start an exciting career in healthcare!