What should the medical assistant do first?

A day in the life of a medical assistant can be varied and challenging. No matter if you work in the front office, provide clinical care or a combination of both, you’re likely to have a fast-paced workday. If you’re looking for a career that keeps you stimulated and on your toes, medical assisting may be right for you.

Medical offices often open at eight a.m.; earlier if early hour appointments are available. You may choose to arrive at work a half-hour before patients are scheduled to arrive in order to prepare for the day. Typically, a clinical medical assistant begins her day by:

• Reviewing the daily patient schedule with the physician
• Listening to any phone messages that came in during the night
• Organizing charts
• Filling out paperwork needed for the day, such as surgical permission forms, health check forms and insurance paperwork
• Preparing patient rooms as needed, such as for minor surgery or procedures

Some clinics have a unit coordinator available in each clinical section. The unit coordinator may help the medical assistants prepare for the day by performing some of the duties listed above. Telephone calls and messages may be handled by a call center, erasing the need for MAs to worry about taking and returning phone calls during scheduled patient care times. Some clinics, however, rely on medical assistants to handle all the responsibilities associated with a daily patient care schedule. For these medical assistants, the day can become very busy, very quickly.

An administrative medical assistant may also be busy the moment her day begins. She may start the day by scheduling appointments, preparing charts to be sent to the clinical MAs, filing or completing patient insurance forms, handling company email and more.

The hours that you’ll work as a medical assistant depend on the facility and whether they offer early and late care appointments. Some clinics are open 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Others with extended hours may be open from 6 a.m.-6 p.m. How early you choose to start your day depends on when you’re scheduled to work and how long your shift is.

Patients Arrive

Once patients begin to arrive for scheduled appointments, the medical assistant must work efficiently to keep things flowing smoothly. The administrative medical assistant checks patients in for their appointment, verifies patient information and health insurance and helps the patient fill out any appropriate forms. The clinical medical assistant then greets the patient and takes her to an exam room. Then, vital signs are taken, a patient interview is done and the patient is prepared for any procedures, if applicable.

In between rooming patients, medical assistants assist the physician with procedures; give injections or medications to patients, answer phone calls, update patient charts, draw blood, perform laboratory tests and handle any emergencies that arise.

A popular physician or specialist may have a jam-packed patient schedule, giving the medical assistant little time for other duties in between rooming patients. Patients don’t always arrive on time for their appointments, which can disrupt a nicely planned daily schedule. Other patients may walk-in for urgent treatment without an appointment and need to be seen. Additionally, a physician may take longer with a patient or be called out for an emergency; these things can impact how well the daily schedule flows. A medical assistant can quickly find herself running behind.

Taking Breaks

Clinics are required to offer employees breaks and a lunch time. These times of quick rest are often welcome breaks in an otherwise busy day. You’ll usually receive a break in the morning, a longer break around noon and another short break in the afternoon. Medical assistants working with extremely busy physicians may skip smaller breaks just to get work done, depending on how the day is going.

Completing the Day

A medical assistant’s day isn’t done when the daily patient schedule is over. Many times, you’ll need to complete tasks left unfinished from the day. Returning phone calls, completing patient charts, scheduling appointments and handling prescription refills are common tasks left at the day’s end.

It is not uncommon for patient appointments to last well past their scheduled time. You may find that you have patients still being cared for even though the daily schedule is complete. As the doctor’s assistant, you’ll need to help complete the patient’s care and take care of any necessary tasks.

The end of the day can also bring time to finish work in peace and quiet without pressures from the demands of the day. Medical assistants may choose to stay a little late and complete tasks while taking time to unwind from the day. Preparing what you can for the next day is helpful so there will be less to do the next morning. Good organization skills, patience, stamina and a love for the job are all beneficial for handling the fast-pace of medical assisting.

I want to be a medical assistant... but where do I start?

If you’re looking for a new direction, you may be wondering about a career as a medical assistant. You already know that by joining the fast-paced medical field, you’ll play a crucial role in helping patients and providing a great healthcare experience.

A medical assistant career could be the perfect entry point into the healthcare field you have your sights set on. But what medical assistant skills and education requirements are needed to land a position? We’ve got the answers to all your questions. But first, let’s take a quick look at some basic medical assistant career information you may be curious about.

Medical assistant career info you want to know

It’s no wonder you’re intrigued at the idea of pursuing this position, especially considering the optimistic career outlook. Medical assistant jobs are projected to grow more than four times the average for all occupations, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).1

What’s more is that the medical assistant education requirements aren’t nearly as extensive as other careers in the healthcare field. You can earn a Medical Assisting Diploma from Rasmussen University in as few as 12 months in a traditional format or as few as 6-9 months in a subscription-based competency-based education format.2 This means you could be just one year away from making an impact in the lives of patients. Once you land a position, you can expect to earn a median annual salary of $33,610, according to the BLS.1

The knowledge and skills gained during this training will help you meet the medical assistant qualifications needed to carry out the daily job duties. But what are those duties, exactly? Let’s take a closer look.

Common medical assistant job duties

In order to understand the medical assistant skills needed, you’ll first want to take a look at the duties they’re responsible for in a typical shift.

Medical assistants work in healthcare facilities; typically in medical clinics, with patients, doctors and nurses all vying for their time. They perform both administrative and clinical duties under the direction of a physician or registered nurse. A medical assistant career is patient-facing, with days spent interacting with individuals of all different backgrounds.

The BLS outlines a few of the duties medical assistants can expect to do, including the following1:

• Scheduling patient appointments
• Maintaining medical records, and billing and coding information for insurance
• Preparing patients for examination
• Helping physicians with patient examinations
• Taking and recording vital signs, such as blood pressure
• Drawing blood
• Preparing blood samples for laboratory tests
• Giving patients injections or medications as directed by a physician (in some states)

If you plan on becoming a medical assistant, you can anticipate spending your shifts doing these types of activities. With a combination of behind-the-scenes and front office duties to juggle, medical assistant careers require a wide range of skills. But some are more sought after than others. Keep reading to see which ones employers value most.

Medical assistant skills you’ll need to succeed

Medical assistant job requirements include a mix of clinical skills and administrative skills. Check out this video for a high-level look at what is expected of these healthcare pros.

If you’re looking for more detail about what employers are looking for in a medical assistant resume, here’s some more information for you. We used real-time job analysis software to examine more than 122,000 medical assistant job postings from the past year.3 The data helped us determine the exact medical assistant skills employers are seeking.

As we mentioned before, medical assistant skills can be broken up into clinical and administrative categories. Here’s what we found in our analysis:

Top clinical skills for medical assistants3

• Patient care
• Vital signs measurement
• Injections
• Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR)
• Electrocardiogram (EKG)
• Phlebotomy
• Patient preparation
• Life support
• Medical terminology
• Patient/family education

Top administrative skills for medical assistants3

• Scheduling
• Appointment setting
• Customer service
• Electronic medical records
• Medical coding
• Patient flow
• Computer literacy
• Telephone skills
• Collaboration
• Multitasking

Start honing your medical assistant skills

After reviewing the medical assistant job requirements, you’ve likely identified some qualities and skills you already possess that make you a great fit for the field. If you’re a great communicator who enjoys multitasking and interacting with others, all you’re missing are the technical skills needed to carry out the job duties.

That’s where the medical assistant education comes into play. Completing a post-secondary program will help equip you with the technical knowledge and training you’ll need to succeed. Learn more about how the Rasmussen University Medical Assisting program can help you get started.

1 Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Outlook Handbook, [accessed April 2019]. Information represents national, averaged data for the occupations listed and include workers at all levels of education and experience. Employment conditions in your area may vary.
2 Time to complete is dependent on accepted transfer credits and courses completed each quarter.
3 Burning-glass.com (analysis of 122,259 medical assistant job postings, Apr. 01, 2018 – Mar. 31, 2019).
EDITOR'S NOTE: This article was originally published in December 2013. It has since been updated to include information relevant to 2019.