How Much Would I Earn in Miami?

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Medical Coding Bell CurveOnce you have earned a certification in medical billing and coding, you have the ability to find a good job in many different parts of the country.  Some markets pay more than others.  Some markets have a high cost of living while others do not.   Knowing what you can expect to earn in this field (in any given zip code) can really help you decide where you want to go to ply your new trade.  To determine how much you could earn in any town in the USA, I recommend the salary wizard at www.salary.com where you enter in your job title and zip code where you’d like to work to find out what the earning potential is there.

Netizens, Protect Yourself From Clickjacking!

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OK Allen School Online students.  You’re online a good portion of the day every day right?  You know your way around the Internet and likely spend alot of time using social media to stay in touch.  But beware the latest threat to cyber living: clickjacking.  Clickjacking is defined in this excellent Wired online article thusly: “Clickjacking, put simply, is when a button, image, video, or some form of embedded content on a website is overlaid by an invisible layer that sits on top of the site underneath it. For instance, you may see a page with a movie embedded on it. You want to watch the movie, so you click on the play button. You don’t think twice about it — you’ve done it a million times. Meanwhile, a hacker has superimposed an invisible web page over the movie. It just so happens that a button allowing access to your camera and microphone has been placed over the movie’s play button. Now, when you think you’re playing the movie, you’re actually permitting the hacker to access your video camera and microphone.” Read the rest of the article to learn how to avoid being taken by clickjackers.

Noticeably Absent

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Noticeably absent from this depressing article about the disappearance of middle class jobs was any mention of declining numbers of available careers in medical fields.  The middle class squeeze, as we all know, has hit hard at industries like manufacturing where thousands of jobs in factories and assembly lines have been sent overseas to “low cost labor markets”  like China and India or automated with robotics and other technologies.  But this article showed the top five hardest hit career fields outside of manufacturing.  They were: Travel Agents Five-year decline: 14% Vocational Education Middle School Teachers Five-year decline: 14.4% Broadcast News Analysts Five-year decline: 15.9% Agricultural Engineers Five-year decline: 18.4% Transit and Rail Police Five-year decline: 18.7% Notice what was (thankfully) not included in this sad list?  If you said, “medical industry jobs”, give yourself a prize!

We’re Number 3!

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Yahoo! recently published a list of the top 5 fastest growing jobs in the medical field.  Medical Records and Health Information Technician took the number 3 place on the list!  With a very attractive average annual salary, medical billing and coding specialists can anticipate continued strength in the job market for people with their qualifications.  Click here to view the list and the entire article.

Access Your Files From Anywhere

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One of the best parts about online study is that you can study whenever you carve the time out to do so.  And, you’re not tethered to any one particular location.  For many of us that means we can study wherever we can bring our laptop.  Think, coffee shop, airport, friend’s houses, etc.  But, even that level of portability can become cumbersome.  Particularly if you’re not keen on moving around with a very expensive laptop or other device.  Yet, you can work wherever there is a machine available.  Think, library, hotel business center, Kinko’s or on friend’s machines at their homes.  To do this though, you need to be able to access your own files from a remote machine.  This has grown increasingly simple in recent years as “cloud computing” and other technological innovations have permitted such accessibility.  Here’s an excellent “how to” article on using these new “sharing” technologies from the Hot To Wiki at Wired.com.

Fascinating Answers to Gripping Medical Questions

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What causes “brain freeze” when eating ice cream or other cold treats too fast?  Admit it, you have always wanted to know why that happens right?  I know I have.   With today being the first day of summer, and the Northeastern humidity already squeezing beads of sweat out of my forehead, I am sure the local custard stand in every neighborhood is seeing increased business traffic.  So watch out.  Brain freeze is lurking just around the corner.  Waiting to make you ache as you consume your chocolate-vanilla twist with rainbow sprinkles.  The nice people at Mother Nature Network have answered the question “what causes brain freeze” in detail in the article linked here.  As a future member of the medical field, you’ll need to know the answers to pressing questions like this one.

They Said It Couldn’t Be Done

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If you’re just beginning your course of study with the Allen School Online, you may be wondering if you can make it.  Perhaps you were forced out of another career path by the economy.  Maybe there are people in your life who tell you its a mistake and that you cannot succeed in this new direction.  Let me urge you to tell the naysayers and nattering nabobs of negativity to stifle their criticisms.  You can do this!  Anything that one sets one’s mind to accomplish can be done if the determination and dedication is there.  Consider the image at the top of this post.  If you had asked people “Is it possible to build a river ON TOP of another river” you would likely have a hard time finding someone who would say it were possible.  Yet, engineers and physicists in Germany did this seemingly impossible feat.  This demonstrates the potential for success if the will is strong to pursue it.  Share these images with anyone in your life who wants to dissuade you from your goal.  Click “more” to see the rest of these phenomenal photos. Continue reading…

Honoring Thy Father

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Maybe your dad was the person who motivated you to seek your medical billing and coding certification.  Maybe you’re a dad who decided to retrain in this field to secure a better job to support your children.  Maybe neither of these things are true about you.  Nonetheless, we all owe a debt of gratitude to our fathers for their contributions to our lives.  I for one thank my pop for all he did to help promote my education as a youth.  He worked untold hours to ensure that I got the opportunity to attend good schools and get a solid education.  This Sunday is Father’s Day.  So don’t forget to send a shout out to your pops and let them know how much you love them.  Oh, and if you run into my son, please remind him to do the same.

Dress for Success or, The Idiot’s Guide to Ironing

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Having your new certification and a brain full of knowledge is great, but as we all know, landing a job often comes down to making a good first impression at the interview.  Part of making that good first impression is obviously the way you speak and interact with the interviewer and how you convey your qualifications.  Yet, even more subtle but no less important is the visual first impression you make.  How you’re dressed and how you take care of your appearance is a powerful, unspoken indicator of how you will be as an employee.  To this point, it is critical that you wear appropriate clothes and that these clothes are nicely pressed and creased in the proper places.  This brings me to the point.  I don’t know about you, but I cannot afford to spend $12 per outfit to the dry cleaner for pressed shirts and pants.  Furthermore, I am challenged when it comes to ironing these items myself.  That was until I found this great post on Lifehacker.com explaining the finer points on DIY clothes pressing.  Read up on how to bone up your appearance and show up at the interview crispy, smart and ready to impress.