With all our other concerns, we can easily lose our focus on improving health. Indeed, good medical office staff-patient communication is often emphasized not because it is related to health outcomes but because communication skills are related to higher patient satisfaction scores, less malpractice litigation, lower rates of voluntary termination from Health Plan membership, and increased clinician satisfaction. Although we often conduct our efforts to improve communication between clinicians and patients in the context of these outcomes and rightly so, we must not lose sight of the important link between effective communication and patient health behavior. Research clearly shows that effective medical office staff-patient communication is correlated with desired health outcomes.
All medical assistants, whether working in the front, or back area of the medical office have common responsibilities. They must both be leaders, equally know how to keep the work flow going, all the same understand human personalities and behaviors, differences in a person's ability, principles of health assessment, treatment of disorders, commonly prescribed medications and their interactions, and preventive healthcare measures. The medical assistant working in the front office mostly performs clerical and receptionist duties, where as medical assistants in the back office assist with the clinical tasks.
Medical Assistants should have good communication skills as they often assist in registering new patients and assist with form completion, retrieve charts, enter patient data and demographics into a computer database, perform various typing requests, maintain and file treatment records, prepare schedules, call patients with appointment reminders, answer phones and route messages, call the pharmacy for prescription order refills, and arrange for a patient's hospital admission. They also make sure copies of lab test results are mailed to patients, handle billing and bookkeeping procedures, and must demonstrate the ability to meet deadlines and handle multiple tasks. Typing, keyboarding, and computer skills, and knowledge of the Corel or Microsoft Office applications, thorough knowledge of medical terminology, efficient filing skills, basic grammar, spelling and arithmetic, knowledge of the scheduling, registration, or admission process, and excellent customer services skills are essential to do this job.
Excellent "people" and interpersonal communication skills, and patience are extremely important since Medical Assistant are often responsible for: Appointment scheduling over the phone, Patient reception and seating, Preparing patients for examination, Bookkeeping, and basic accounting, Dealing with insurance billing, and coding. Also the sorting, pulling, and filing medical records. Explaining treatment procedures to patients, assisting during the examinations. In some case helping to administer medications to patients, assisting in performing basic diagnostic screening tests, changing wound dressings, collecting laboratory specimens. As well as guiding pharmacy reps through the office and also ordering and restocking office supplies.
Assignments:
1. Please read and study textbook pages 137-153
2. Complete study review questions pages 107-110
3. Please view the videos below:
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