US Certified Medcoders | Processing and Registration
What is Medical Coding?
Medical coding is the process of translating patients’ diagnoses and procedures and supplies information from the medical record into alphanumeric codes to facilitate and standardize the billing forms of doctors’ offices.
What is the CPC Certification?
This certification is conferred by the American Academy of Professional Coders or AAPC and is the gold standard in coding for physician offices.
What is AAPC?
In the United States, AAPC is one of the organizations that provide certification and training to medical coders and the largest governing body of coders in the world.
Why now is the right time to become an US Medical Coder?
A recent report from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that healthcare related occupations and industries are expected to add 15.6 million jobs between 2012 and 2022, and 40,000 or more of them will be Medical Coders. It is an exciting time for medical coders. The current system for reporting medical diagnoses and in-patient procedures is the International Classification of Diseases ICD-9. The US healthcare must transition to a new system, ICD-10 by October 1, 2015, or face huge fines. It means two things for medical professionals:
- More job openings in the US
- More jobs in the Philippines and India since part of it will have to be outsourced.
How can I become a Certified Medical Coder?
You can enroll in an online review program which takes about eight weeks. The online program also includes live coaching sessions to answer your questions and clear confusion about any topic. Once ready, a certification exam will be given composed of a 150-item multiple-choice part and a freestyle clinical part made up of 20 patient chart excerpts. Once you pass the exam, you can obtain the CPC® certification. The passing rate for the Filipino exam takers after eight weeks of review is about 85%. If we include the second time takers who failed on the first try, this rate is close to 95%. There is no additional exam fee paid for taking the exam a second time if within a year.
From searching US Medical coders examination and other qualifications can be overwhelming especially to foreign candidates who are not acquainted with or had no knowledge in applying for the US Medical coders exam. Due to this licensure application process, candidates are advised to seek assistance from a specialized application preparation center like NEAC Medical Exams Center. NEAC is an innovative pioneer medical exams application center that offers easy and fast exam applications for US Medical coders exams and will do all the work for your exam application for the best price to avoid financial losses and delays that may cause rejections of your application.
For further inquiries about the requirements, qualifications, and fees for the US Medical coders exam application, kindly email us at info@medcoderscenter.com
FAQs
The first requirement is medical terminology training (or a good background in medicine, such as nursing). Formerly, it took two to four-year college programs to learn to code. However, currently, training is available through technical schools, correspondence courses, and simple, concise, yet thorough online home study programs.
Providers who employ coders prefer some assurance of the coder's background and capability.
Medical transcriptionists type the reports coders review to determine the treatment and diagnostic codes.
When a care provider performs a service, they will dictate a report or note on the services provided. That textual document becomes a part of the primary record, and the coder reviews it to abstract and codifies what was done.
Expert Medical Coding courses prepare our students to sit for AAPC's Certified Professional Coder (CPC) exam and AHIMA's Certified Coding Associate (CCA) exams. Both AAPC and AHIMA are nationally recognized coding and HIM professional certification organizations, and most employers seek after their certifications. AHIMA requires one to two years of coding experience to sit for more advanced certifications like the CCS and CCS-P.
A trained and certified medical coder undertakes medical coding. A medical coder starts medical coding by reviewing the physician's notes of the previous day's batch of patients.
Some medical facilities hire coders who work from home instead of in-house offices. This form of outsourcing lets the candidate pay for only what they need when they need it. Remote medical coders work away from the health institution they are paid to code for.
NOS stands for Not Otherwise Specified. It refers to codes that don't have sufficient information that allows the use of a specific code. To put it simply, NOS means there is little information in the documentation of a patient encounter, and this deficiency is preventing them from coding to a higher specificity.
In medical coding, the NCD provides the extent to which Medicare covers services and procedures. It is a legal requirement for Medicare contractors to follow the NCD guidelines.
Virtually every provider, individual doctor, clinic, hospital involved in patient care requires coders. In addition, insurance companies, contract care providers, governmental agencies, law firms, third party administrators, billing and practice management companies, need coders.