Any medical transcriptionists out there?

After much consideration, I have decided to ditch my expensive education degree, which I am not really using (have only been subbing for several years), and try to become trained as a medical transcriptionist. I realize that full-time teaching is not for me (WAY too stressful), and being a substitute pays absolutely nothing. Maybe potential employers in the medical transcription field will be impressed that I have an education degree? I'm not so sure.

Anyway, I would love some input from someone that is currently working as a medical transcriptionist. I have a lot of questions that I hope you can answer. How long did it take to complete your program? Was it very expensive? Did you have much trouble getting a job after completing your training? Are you able to work from home? Do you enjoy your job? What is your yearly salary? If there is anyone here that lives in North Texas--the DFW area--do you know of any reputable training programs in the area? I see commercials all the time for Carrington College and Remington College, but I don't know much about them. I would really prefer an online program.

Any help would be appreciated!

I am not a transcriptionist but I took a Medical Billing and Coding course which was 9 months long.  I started working shortly after finishing school but there were people in my class who weren't as fortunate with employment.  I have worked for the same company for 3 years and have worked from home for 2 1/2 years.  I had to work in the office for the first six months and pass an audit before I could start working from home.  The pay isn't great but working from home certainly helps up the actual value of my income.  I use less gas for the car, less wear and tear on the car which adds to my income.  You also don't realize how much the little things that you use more of because of physically going to work adds up. 

Hopefully someone who has done this work is here.  I know when I was going through the billing and coding course I found out there were a couple of people here who had done it in the past.

Thanks for the info. I have actually been considering doing medical billing and coding as well. Maybe if I train in both fields, I could increase my chances of employment. I have heard that transcription work pays more, but I am not entirely sure.

I know someone who went through the medical transcription training and never found work.

I have a medical office diploma and part of my training is medical transcription. I loved doing transcription and tried to find a job doing it after but couldn't. It's tough, you have to be able to type fast, understand different accents and follow a lot of formatting rules. My course was $10,300 and was 8 months long. At the school I went to, the transcription course was a year long but self taught. Basically, you just go sit in the classroom and do your work and then go home.

Thanks for the replies everyone, but this does not sound very encouraging. Maybe I should consider doing something else?

Do you dislike teaching in general or is it the chaos and politics involved with teaching in the public schools?  There are other options such as the private tutoring companies.  I know there are multiple ones in this area, the one that I remember off the top of my head is Sylvan.  I know nothing about the pay or benefits but that could be an option.

There is also an online option that is nationwide and accepted by a majority of states, I know Ohio accepts it.  I am sure there would be employment opportunities there as well.

I did apply to Sylvan about two years ago. The pay that they offered me was even less than what I make subbing, and it would have been a very part-time job. They only needed me for one hour a day--from 3:00 to 4:00 in the afternoon. Who does that?

I have worked in a few medical offices.  My advice is to really research before committing to the career change.  The first doctor I worked for sent his notes to India for transcription.  I was told they essentially have too many people with nursing and doctor degrees there; so people end up doing transcription work.  Part of my job was to proof read the typed medical notes that would come back and print them out.  The doctor's wife did the billing.  

The other office I worked in; I did it all.  The typing, the billing, the front desk, etc.  The transcription work for that job was much simpler.  It helped a lot that it was an Audiologist's office and she was also a Speech Therapist. She enunciated beautifully.    Another doctor who shared office space with that first doctor I worked for; wow.  Just wow.  He would stand at the nurses station and dictate his notes very quickly and very softly.  I don't know how anyone could have done his transcriptions!  

I did not have any specialized training for those jobs; other than having taken an Administrative Assistant course to add some marketable skills to my Interior Design degree.  I got the jobs because of who I knew.  I learned the rest on the job.

Having said all that; I wish you nothing but luck with your decision!  My cousin taught Kindergarten for 5 years before deciding she couldn't stand it anymore.  She is in the Clinicals phase of earning her degree in Medical Imaging.  She loves it so far.  She just jokes that she does things backwards; getting her Associates after her Bachelors.     There are multiple medical centers in her area; so hopefully finding employment will be easy enough for her.  

I think all of the para medical areas are changing so fast and corporations are always looking to cut costs.  I know the company I work for opened an office in Lithuania and my clients work went to them.  After about a year they had me take work back but they also were doing it.  I got tired of cleaning up after them but I said nothing, the last thing I wanted was to be labeled a complainer.  It got to the point I was doing most of it because people in Lithuania don't know anything about the U.S. system.  They then decided to try to give them coding because so much of it was automated.  My biggest client had finally had enough.  Their contract came up for renewal and the client insisted that all work be done by people in the States.  It took 6 weeks to iron that out and get the contract written for people in the U.S. only handling their work.  I came back from jury duty to 6 weeks of work to get caught up.

Since you do have a degree it may  be to your advantage to look into something like nursing.  It may not take all that much longer for you to take the courses necessary to get into student nursing.  There are also some things like respiratory therapy that don't take as long as nursing.  Something that involves actual patient care can't be outsourced overseas.