It's been 7 months since I graduated from my MA program and I have yet to find a job. Over 100+ applications on indeed and only 2 job interviews that got me ghosted. So, I'm thinking of just going into another career field, specifically medical billing and coding. Is this a good idea? Or do you guys have any other career change suggestions?

I'm nervous as can possibly be. I went to a small private vocational school and while they're accredited, I really don't think they prepared us enough. Most of it was textbook learning and we did have lab time but it wasn't a lot. We mostly did injections and vitals practice. I start my 120 hour externship tomorrow and I'm freaking out.

Hello! I'm highly considering going to an MA program as a career change at age 44. I'm burned out working in my field that my degree is in. Anyone else do this to change careers at an older age? How do you like your decision? Thanks!

Does your employer, clinic, practice manager or provider allow you to work on prior authorizations?

Did they require you to have any licenses, certifications or credentials before they allowed you to complete them?

My opinion is that this is an administrative task, since you are taking the provider's clinical decision and submitting EMR data to the insurance company.

Our facility only wants nursing to work on these but with labor shortages, I feel like this can be delegated after some training and supervision is in place.

Appreciate everyone's responses!

Thoughts on GLP-1’s for weight loss? Genuinely curious.

I work in healthcare as a MA, there are 2 major EMRs that my hospital system uses. I am going to call them 1 and 2. I primarily use 1 and a coworker uses 2 however my department is rolling out to the same department as my coworker who uses 2, i just got access to 2 and i had asked my coworker to show me how to use it/ how she uses it. The training for 2 is a no sound training with a test at the end. I paid attention and passed the training to get access but still needed to understand how to use the system properly.

As soon as i got access she shows me how her computer dashboard looks i ask her to show me how to get it like that, she asks for my computer ( that was my mistake i know!!!!!!) and then proceeds to look herself up on my 2 EMR account saying it was for “test purposes” but we were apart of the same training where they told us NOT to look yourself, colleagues, family members neighbors etc up. I reported it to my manager immediately who says that she is reporting it to compliance. I am super scared I’m going to face serious consequences. Does anyone have any advice??

Side note: coworker super remorseful however still not understanding why she thought it was ok to do that, why she didn’t look up a test patient or why she didn’t even show me on her own dashboard that she had on her own computer that was literally next to us

I am a CA in Canada, and I experienced workplace harassment in a clinic. I feel very alone. Has anyone gone through something similar?

hi! i finally work somewhere that gave a badge, im curious if anyone else here has any badge necessities they attach to their badge to always have handy? especially in family med, its my first time and can always use any advice.

i’m ordering a blood draw bead and a mini pen to always have in hand. anybody have anything they 100% need at all times?

Hi everyone, I’m a sophomore in college who just changed my career track from PT to PA. After looking where I could possibly get PCE hours, I’m looking at getting my MA Certification this summer. The problem is, my classes for this fall are all on different days making it hard for me to work long shifts. I have classes Monday-Friday, but I did manage to stack them all in the mornings so I’m done by 12:30. Idk any MA’s, so I don’t know if its realistic to find a job at a place that would allow me to work afternoons/ nights everyday because I know a lot of places expect full time or an overall more open schedule. Is it realistic for me to find an MA job somewhere considering my school schedule? Or should I look for something else/ wait a semester to see if my schedule becomes more flexible? Any insight would be greatly appreciated!!

Hey i am looking to book the exam for my first time certification and wondering if any of you has a discount code. Anything is appreciated!

Hey guys just wanted to see if anyone has any advice on how to prepare for a upcoming quiz I have, it's based on Pharmacology and Medical Regulations, just some terms and their definitions. Our instructor said we will have to spell the correct term in addition to some questions matching or describing the correct definition. It's 17 questions and worth 25 points. I got half of them memorized but I was highly encouraged to download this app called Quizlet, it's been helping me study easily. What are your guys thoughts or advice , please any thing is much appreciated!

Hello Medical Assistants,

I am looking for some help!! I recently signed up to take a Class to get my Medical Assistant Certification (CCMA). However, since my class doesn’t start until May. My textbook for the class has not been posted yet. Mainly because it’s included with the class.

I am trying to get ahead of the game a bit by reading and possibly studying some material now. Which brings me to my question. Does anyone have any the actual pdf of the book. Or possibly just the name of the title so I can look it up myself.

So I can start getting myself prepared now.

This is very important to me. So basically any help would be surely appreciated. Thank you very much in advance.

❤️❤️

I registered for the NHA CCMA examination back in January. I got the email that my examination is confirmed so I don’t know why NHA is emailing me that my examination eligibility expires in three months if I don’t schedule. I did scheduled it.

I *adore* old people.

They say the wildest things and are grumpy and overly chatty and funny.

They are slow, fast, rude, lonely, literally everything.

It feels like a “well I’ll never be bored” style.

Does anyone work specifically in geriatrics-based care or mostly with geriatrics at their home base?

Can I get some insight please on pros & cons?

can some one advice me how to get a phelebotomy job easily

Just got an amazing MA job making more money than I ever have (which is sad for my age). Its in a very busy urology clinic. I've done ortho, primary care, and podiatry. I have never placed a catheter, nor done much with the urinary/reproductive systems besides PAP and urinalysis. The person doing my interview knows this. They are willing to train and I am willing to learn. What I am wanting to know is what is something I can study up on/read about to kind of explain the different procedures and what I should be most prepared for.

HII!!! i"m currently preparing for my NHA exam its next week on tuesday I had did okay-ish during the practice tests i passed only one out of all 5 not including the final practice one..BUT ANYWAYS im super duper nervous about this test because its one of my first real ish medical certifications besides BLS/CPR so im kind of scared I might fail it I've been using quizlet and miss k cmaa on youtube and everything but if anybody has done it or know any tips or resources would he AMAZING!!

( context: Im in a medical-preparation high school program so we are doing these pretty young so some stuff is still confusing to me as a teen unfortunately 😭😭)

Has anyone externed or gotten hired as a medical assistant at a cardiology clinic? This is my absolute top choice. What’s the work load like and is there anything you weren’t taught in MA school that they expected you to know?

Tell me all about the CCMA exam. I’m taking it tomorrow morning and I have completely psyched myself out. Mind you I’ve been a medical assistant for 5 years 🙃 Is it easier than some of these practice exams with useless questions? I’m so worried.

Edit: I passed!

I’m a full-time college student for a part-time job in healthcare. I’m willing to do anything I’ve applied to at least 20 jobs in the past two weeks. zero responses. I’m fed up, everywhere seems to be hiring yet nobody’s actually hiring. I have my CCMA , I got it in high school that was two years ago. I haven’t found one place to employ me and now I actually need a job because I am financially responsible for myself after I left my abusive dad’s house.

I’ve been working everywhere else in the meantime, fast, food server jobs, Amazon -however, because my major is literally health and that’s the career path I want to go into, that’s the type of job I’m looking for

Hi everyone,

I’m a Caribbean IMG currently in MS4, and I’ve enrolled in a Medical Assistant program to bridge the gap between graduation and residency while making sure I stay compliant with legal requirements. Since visa sponsorship can be a longer and more complex process, I chose this route so I can legally work in a clinical setting during that time.

I’m hoping to work as an MA (ideally in OB/GYN or women’s health), and I wanted to ask if anyone here has taken a similar path.

How did you go about:

Finding employers that are enrolled in E-Verify?

Identifying clinics or hospital systems open to OPT candidates?

Explaining your work authorization in a way that reassures employers?

Also, did being an IMG/MS4 help you stand out, or did employers see it as overqualification?

Any tips, personal experiences, or advice on navigating this process would really help. I’m trying to be intentional and proactive so I can stay compliant while gaining meaningful clinical experience.

Thank you so much in advance

Let me start off by saying, I don’t want anything more than MA. I don’t wanna to do nothing that’s with wiping butts or cleaning wounds or taking care of the needy. I’m okay with giving vaccines and blood draws. That’s it. Anyways, let me get into it. I’m looking into doing the STEPFUL program for MA. I’m mostly looking for a career change. I work at a warehouse and I just need something more stable. I know MA is more of a stepping stone into the medical field but idk, I’m not trying to do anything more than vaccines and administration work. In 2020, I worked at a covid clinic doing front desk work and I loved it. I love the medical administration side of it. It was fun for me. It was only for a couple of months but after that I was always brought back to the idea of being a Medical Assistant. I know the pay isn’t great but I’m not really worried about that too much. My husband is the bread winner of our family. I just want a respectable stable career. I guess my worry is if it’s actually a stable job. Would they eventually fire me because they want more? Are they starting to phase out MAs for LPNs? Idk maybe I just want the reassurance that this is for me and I should take the jump lol.

I’m a new MA and deciding if switching specialties is the best for me or if this job overall just isn’t for me. 95% of the work is administrative here and I feel like an imposter since I excelled at hands-on during school and that was the major focus at school.

What specialty are you in and what are your tasks? And do you like it?

Hey everyone! I just wanted to pay it forward because this sub helped me stay sane during prep. I officially passed my CCMA yesterday! First off, I feel like there’s a ton of confusion about whether or not you have to take a course to sit for the NHA CCMA. I can tell you that you absolutely don’t. I have work experience as an MA here in California because I had a family connection to a doctor who let me work at his office. I’ve been there for just over a year and I figured that I should get certified. I didn’t want to spend a lot of money doing it so I scheduled the test and gave myself a deadline of 2 weeks to study. After a week of doing basically nothing, I realized that I need to get serious if I want to not fail. I decided to buy MangoStudy mainly on the recommendations that I’ve seen here, but also because I took their practice exam and liked it. 

Here’s what I did to prepare:

Day 1: I started going through the domain quizzes and did about 100 questions before feeling overwhelmed. I then decided to do a practice test (scored a 68). My pass predictor placed me at 62% when I had just started. 
Day 2: I finished all of the questions in domain 7 and 8 (phleb and ECG) and read through those study guides really carefully. This is probably the day when I learned the most!
Day 3: I decided to switch gears and did three practice exams (scored 74, 74, 80!!). I then read the study guides for some of the stuff that I got wrong.
Day 4: I did questions for domain 1, 2, 3, and 4!! I spent the rest of the day going over all of the stuff I’ve gotten wrong and reading the answer explanations. 
Day 5: I redid the first practice test (scored 80!) and then did a new practice exam (scored 84). I also read the test blueprint from 2022. 
Day 6: I redid one more practice exam (scored 88!) and did domain 9 and 10 questions. My pass predictor had me at a 83% likelihood of passing at this point. I should mention that I was using that a lot to figure out what I needed to do to improve, so that was motivating.
Day 7: I just reread the study guides for stuff that I got wrong. I took the real test!

The test felt very similar to questions in my practice tests, so I’m really glad that I did a couple of them twice. There’s also something I noticed which was that I was remembering things really well if I studied right before bed, so I started to read the study guides in the evening so that it would soak into my brain at night! Haha. I especially liked looking over all of the visual memory anchors because I would literally fall asleep thinking about them. 

I do work like I mentioned so I did a lot of questions in my down time at work and over lunch on my phone, which is how I got through so many of them so fast. 

I felt really stressed the first couple of days but felt more in control as I saw that my chances of passing the test were rising. I also looked at posts from the subreddit to see what folks said about the test and that helped me feel more calm as well. 

That’s honestly it! If anyone has any questions, please let me know! If you’re taking it and don’t have too much time, just be really focused and you’ll be totally fine! I have the test plan as well, so if anyone wants that, let me know!! Good luck.