While you do not necessarily need experience to work as a medical coding specialist, it is crucial to have enough knowledge to help you discover success in this profession. Need to note that with or without experience, you must have confidence in your abilities. Knowing the specific skills and education you need will make it easier to secure employment in this job. Please use these steps to pursue a career as a medical coding specialist.
How to Become a Medical Coder?
Here are steps to become a medical coder, with or without experience:
- Meet the basic prerequisites
Obtain a high school diploma and pass a background check. Remember that having a criminal history will make it harder for you to discover employment both in this job and elsewhere.
- Get medical coding training
Get practical training to assist you perform your tasks as a medical coding specialist successfully. While you do not need to meet any formal education requirements to reach a career as a medical coding specialist, most employers want the candidates with a postsecondary certificate or an associate’s degree at a minimum. Please consider the kind of education you want to get and the benefits which each options provides:
- Certificate program
A certificate program will help you get into the medical coding job at a quicker rate and gives you a strong foundation of medical coding knowledge. Certificate programs frequently focus on areas like medical terminology, treatment procedures, and basic coding. Also, you are able to learn about medical office software and billing procedures. - Associate degree
As a prospective medical coder, you are also able to reach an associate’s degree in an area like healthcare administration or health information management. While an associate program covers what you learned in a certificate program, it also gives you a liberal arts education that allows you to increase your communication and critical thinking skills. Although it will take longer to obtain an associate’s degree compared to a certificate, the employers will prefer the candidates with a professional degree. Even, you are able to transfer your associate degree toward a bachelor’s degree program if you want to further your education. - Bachelor’s degree
Of course, it will take longer to reach a bachelor’s degree, but this option will offer a more complete way to a career as a medical coding specialist. Also, obtaining a bachelor’s degree may give you a competitive advantage when applying for medical coding professions. If you decide to reach a bachelor’s degree, please consider studying healthcare administration or health information management. For your information, a bachelor’s degree program teaches you not only the medical coding basics, but you also get knowledge and training in broader healthcare management concepts. Aside from that, you are also able to learn about other areas like health policy, project management and legislative compliance.
- Obtain your medical coding certification
You have to consider getting your medical coding certification to show your dedication to your profession. Also, getting certified shows hiring managers that you have the skills required to perform the job well. While you do not need to specialize, having a specialty will be able to improve your job prospects. Several medical coding certifications to consider include the Certified Coding Associate, Certified Professional Coder, and Certified Coding Specialist. Also, you are able to specialize in areas like anesthesia, ambulatory care or family practice.
- Improve your medical coding skills
Before you apply for medical coding specialist jobs, you have to improve your skills in this job. To become a medical coding specialist, you must have hard and soft skills. Several technical skills to learn include customer billing, physiology, inpatient coding, medical terminology and anatomy. Keep in mind that you are able to learn those skills through a Medical Coding Certificate program. Several soft skills medical coders use include collaboration, research, communication and computer literacy skills.
For your information, Senior medical coding specialists make a national average salary of $45,003 per year. Remember that your salary depends on your experience level, your geographic location and your employer.
List of the Companies that Hire the Candidates without Experience
Here is a list of the companies that hire the candidates without experience:
- Maxim Healthcare Group
Maxim Healthcare Group provides the services of medical coding, documentation and auditing for its clients. The company hires long- and short-term medical coding specialists to provide those health information management services. - nThrive
As a company of healthcare information management, nThrive hires a variety of employees including medical coding specialists, the registrars, auditors and transcriptionists. - UnitedHealth Group
This UnitedHealth Group offers lots of medical coding positions including coding consultants and also coding educators. - Aviacode
Aviacode company provides the medical coding, billing, and auditing services to a variety of healthcare professionals, surgical centers and facilities. It offers part-time and full-time employment to medical coders. - Change Healthcare
This Change healthcare company provides a variety of services including the network solutions and software. The company hires everyone from medical coding specialist to senior auditors. - The Coding Network
The company will offer quality assurance and medical coding services to providers. It hires work-from-home medical coders in some medical specialties. - Conifer Health Solutions
The company provides managed services to many healthcare facilities. As a health information services firm, it offers assurance and medical coding specialist jobs. - Humana
As a health insurance company, Humana will offer work-from-home job chances for medical coding specialists, coding educators and case managers. While it has remote positions, the employees in those positions may have to travel to their Kentucky headquarters from time to time. - iMedX
This iMedX company provides health information and clinical documentation services. It hires remote medical coders. - Medical Record Associates
As a health information services firm, Medical Record Associates offers work-from-home medical coding specialist jobs to candidates nationwide. - Altegra Health
Altegra Health company will offer end-to-end reimbursement solutions, employing both on-site and work-from-home employees in the medical coding jobs.
