Medical Assistant Programs In Bakersfield Ca

What Is A Certified Medical Assistant?

Doctors do not perform all the basic tasks related to the medical, administrative and surgical procedures, due to the constraints of time and other obligations. Thus for most, medical and administrative tasks they use the support of a medical assistant. A Medical assistant is a professional who performs routine tasks that are necessary for the proper functioning of health care offices. This includes patient care like measuring a patient’s vital signs, maintaining health records and up keep of various medical instruments. The work can be broadly divided into three categories:

General medical assisting: This includes effectively communicating with the patient and being well versed with various medical terminologies.

Administrative medical assisting: Administrative assisting can involve work in the health insurance sector or with financial bookkeeping required for a public or private hospital.

Clinical medical assisting: This usually involves intensive training and is very important in complementing the work of a health care department. It includes sterilization, maintenance of medical instruments, measuring a patient’s vital signs, and being able to obtain samples for various pathological procedures like blood test.

Steps Necessary To Become A Certified Medical Assistant In Kern County

MA's are required to complete one of the Medical Assistant programs in Bakersfield Ca that takes a year to complete or they may even complete an associate degree medical assistant courses that takes two years. Formal medical assistant training is highly recommended and most accredited programs do offer internships and training. The internship may be within a hospital setting or a general physician’s office. There isn’t any medical assistance licensing requirement, however certain states require them to pass a certain test before they can perform certain procedures like X-ray testing.

Medical Assistant Training Schools In Kern County

Qualification includes only a high school diploma. But a formal education through medical assistant schools or sometimes medical assistant classes is preferred. There are various medical assistant training programs that are offered by vocational schools, community colleges and universities. These programs are usually a yearlong for a certificate course, while associate degree programs may extend up to two years. Accreditation Bureau of Health Education Schools and Commission on Accreditation of Allied Health Education Programs are the two recognized agencies that provide accreditation to medical assistance programs in the country. It is advised to check for accreditation through either of these agencies before applying for any diploma or degree programs. After competing either of the programs assistants can take certificate exam for CMA. CMAs are usually preferred by employers over other applying assistants.

Job Opportunities For Certified Medical Assistants

Employment opportunities for Medical Assistants in Kern County are expected to grow at a rapid rate due to the growth of healthcare sector and due to an aging population. Outpatient settings have also grown in number in the past few years, and this trend is expected to continue. Since, medical assistants work mostly in these setting the job prospects are expected to get better as time passes. In such a scenario medical assistants with a good education, training background and certification can expect good medical assistant jobs offers coming their way. A Medical Assistant salary lies in the range of $29,000 to $37,000 annually.

Hours Worked As A Back Office MA Now Count Towards Physician Assistant Clinical Hours Worked

Some Physician Assistant Programs require a minimum of 3000 hours of clinical work. In past years, this was typically restricted to nursing and hands-on hospital clinical care. The Stanford Physician Assistant Program, which has a Kern County satellite program in Bakersfield, now counts hours worked as a back office medical assistant towards their 3000 hour minimum clinical hours prerequisite.