Medical assisting is a vocation that falls into the so called middle-skills job category. The medical assistant works under the employ and direct supervision of a doctor and side-by-side with various other medical and health care practitioners, nurses and highly specialized technologists in an ambulatory medical office or clinical setting. The minimum requirement to become a medical assistant is a high school diploma and does not require a post-secondary degree from a college, or higher education institution.
Medical assisting as a career is best described as an occupation within the healthcare industry, but medical assistants are not considered skilled professionals such as clinicians, technologists, or registered and licensed nursing staff, as a matter of fact, the medical assistant is not regarded as a professional, or professional career at all, mostly due to the lack of regulatory statutes and specific educational and licensing requirements within each state that would govern the medical assisting discipline. Therefore, the term medical assistant profession, by definition, is technically a misnomer.
Professional By Definition
Professionals, by definition, usually hold a 2-year or more academic degree and are autonomous, which means they have a high degree of control of their own affairs insofar as making independent judgments about their work. This usually means they have the freedom to exercise their own professional judgement and practice their skill independently, such as doctors, nurses, and other licensed health care providers when they practice the art of medicine and patient care.
Medical assistants CANNOT work independently, make independent decisions, triage, give medical advice, change prescriptions, administer medications, or make adjustments to patient care plans. They must work under the direct supervision of the doctor who hired them and are considered assistive and supporting staff. Nevertheless, medical assistants are highly respected and held in high esteem; their function and presence in the medical office is regarded as important and doctors agree they would be lost without them. Patients appreciate their services and assistance to them, their families and the community as a whole.
Medical Assistant Training
Becoming a medical assistant involves work related instruction usually in form of vocational education from a formal adult training program, or on the job training provided and overseen by a physician. Qualified medical assistants may also earn additional credentials and degrees, however taking the medical assistant certification exam remains largely voluntary in most states.
Some medical assistants eventually elect to return back to school to earn a registered nursing (RN) or Health Services Management degree; others seek additional specialized training to earn limited licenses to operate x-ray and cardiology equipment, such as ECG, or Holter monitor devices, or become proficient in phlebotomy, or highly skilled hemodialysis procedures, in particular starting and discontinuing IV lines, which is considered an invasive procedure not usually permitted to be done by medical assistants.
Many medical assistants voluntarily join a professional membership association, such as the AAMA, RMA, NRMA or NHA. These professional bodies typically define, promote, oversee, support and regulate the affairs of its members and require a certain amount of annual continuing education units (CEU) to maintain their membership and credentials active.