medical coding training at home.
If you're thinking about taking training or getting a job as a medical biller, medical billing specialist medical coder or medical insurance specialist online or at your local college, it can be quite confusing. The same job can have different titles and essentially do the same thing. Billers and medical coders or in other words people who do the billing and people who do the coding, having completely separate jobs. Sometimes these jobs are combined and when that's the case the job title may be called a medical insurance specialist. When looking for these jobs one must keep in mind they come in a wide variety of names, many of which are not included here or not known in general.
If you work as a medical coder you would be doing the coding work before the medical biller sees the documents. Coding is highly specialized and takes training in medical coding unless one learns it on the job. In small facilities this job may be combined with billing.
Medical billing involves a variety of tasks including billing, collecting, processing claims and communicating with patients, doctors and health insurance companies. Basically you'll be collecting money whether from an insurance company or patient or both. You'll be using/learning specialized software made for the billing industry.
The salaries for these jobs run about the same except it will vary depending on experience, education and training and can start around $30,000 to $40,000 a year at this writing for entry-level work. This can go up considerably when one becomes more knowledgeable. Medical billers and coders or medical insurance specialists with experience are in high demand. Salaries can vary around the U.S. also depending on whether you live in a large city or small town and how much competition there is between medical billing services or companies.
Many doctors send their billing and coding work out to these companies. Some also work with small or home businesses but getting the foot in the door by starting a small medical billing business is harder especially getting the first doctor to sign up when you don't have any references or testimonials to give. Your small business is where any previous on-the-job experience is important and will pay off even if you have little training or education in medical billing or medical coding.
So getting a job as a medical biller, medical coder or medical insurance specialist will give you a good starting salary plus worthwhile salary raises as you get on-the-job experience. This experience can never be taken away from you and leaving to go to other companies should give you an even higher wage or salary. You can training online or on your local campus. Make sure to compare costs and check out the federal free financial aid, low-interest loans, help and even money available for online courses, programs and training.
medical coding training at home.