Working in the healthcare industry provides a dynamic, fast-paced career that is not only lucrative but also extremely rewarding. Job Bank Canada projects that the demand for medical office administrators will remain high through to the end of the decade. In Ontario specifically, prospects are especially good due to general growth, province-wide investments in new hospitals and healthcare facilities, and upcoming retirements.
At Medix College, our students receive a comprehensive, practical, and relevant education to acquire the knowledge and skills needed to succeed in an administrative role within a medical office. In addition, students are required to complete a 240-hour externship to truly experience their future careers in a real healthcare setting. As you’ll learn during our diploma program, a successful medical office administrator must have excellent organizational skills. Keep reading to learn 5 tips you can use to keep your medical office running smoothly when you graduate.
1. Organize the Physical Space of The Office
When you start your new career after medical office administration school, the first task you’ll want to focus on is organizing the physical space of the office. By going through every space of the office, you’ll not only gain an understanding of where everything is, but you’ll also be able to define areas that are causing workflow barriers and find solutions to them. Decluttering provides a better first impression for clients when they walk in, while labelling everything will help with staff with organization and efficiency.
2. Organize Your Time by Prioritizing Your Tasks
Once you’ve organized the physical aspects of the office, you’ll gain a better understanding of the practice’s priorities and be able to create a list of short and long-term goals. As a medical office administrator, having effective time management is of the utmost importance. To work effectively and proficiently, be sure to prioritize your goals and tasks from urgent to less important. Getting into the habit of creating a daily to-do list with the most urgent tasks at the forefront can keep you focused on accomplishing the most important tasks first.
3. Categorize Your Incoming Mail
Checking and responding to mail can be a very time-consuming aspect of your career. Although many medical office administrators respond to emails and inquiries throughout the day, it can be more efficient to plan a block of time for each day to focus on mail. By using the same prioritization methods that you do with your tasks, you can stay organized by placing mail into 3 distinct categories: urgent, not so urgent, or file. Once you’ve done this, you can attend to urgent matters immediately while putting off less urgent tasks for another time.
4. Use the Technology You Learn in Medical Office Administration School to Your Benefit
Our medical office administration training is current and relevant to today’s modern technologies. Our students are provided with a laptop where they learn different applications and software such as Microsoft Office, AbelMed for OHIP billing, and Accuro for Electronic Medical Records (EMR). Other technologies that can help with organization and efficiency in a medical office include apps and software that handle staff scheduling, patient portals and online scheduling, electronic prescribing, medical and office inventory with scheduled orders, and recovery software for a backup of vital and confidential data.
5. Use an Office Calendar to Keep Everyone Informed
Incorporating an office wide calendar that is accessible to all staff allows for a helpful visual aid with reminders of important events to keep a medical office running smoothly. An office calendar can include information such as staff scheduling, vacation time and requests, meetings, financial report deadlines, and so on. Publishing your office calendar at the beginning of the month and adding to it when new events arise is a vital step to maintaining an organized office.
If you consider yourself to be driven and organized, caring and compassionate, then becoming a medical office administrator may be the perfect career choice for you. At Medix College, our comprehensive program can be completed in person or online in less than a year!
Are you interested in taking a medical office administration course?
Contact Medix College for more information today!
