Good luck, buddy! It's difficult, but definitely doable. You'll be fine as long as you're ready and eager to work, and strive to genuinely get along with people
Are the physicians in this article unable to hire office staff? These jobs - most of them - listed above fall in the realm of "office staff." This is what your receptionist does or your nurses. I have never been to a doctor where the doctor manages the claims process him or herself, or where they are the ones emailing me or calling me.“You don’t train someone for all of those years in [medicine]… and then have them run a claims processing operation for insurance companies.”
Reams of lab results, refill requests, emails, and callbacks pop up continually on the computer screen.
It's up to the doctor to write patient notes. Patient notes aren't really so the doctor knows how to treat you next time you come in. They're for the insurance companies to inspect to decide how much to pay you. And trust me, they don't want to pay you. They only make money when they don't pay you. Whether it's a private insurer or the gov (they're the worst), they won't give you a dime for a service that isn't documented in the notes. To fill out notes correctly, you have to be extensively trained in the art of bullshit administrative work, as all services have "codes", and each service rendered needs to be coded correctly to obtain reimbursement. It's a crazy system, and it forces doctors to work mega overtime just to get paid, and detracts from their one-on-one time with patients (you know, actual patient care). Administrators are ruining medicine, and the ACA is only going to make that worse, I'm afraid.
My wife is a cash-only practice, although she'll put together a superbill if you want to try and hit your insurance. Last year she started contracting out to a firm that does nothing but pump up your patient notes into checking more superbill boxes - the end result being approximately 200% greater returns from the insurance companies. Keep in mind: my wife, in a former life, designed insurance plans for a multinational. In other words, a doctor who spent ten years in the insurance industry can get her patients three times as much money back if she hands her patient notes over to a 3rd party that exists solely to pickaxe more money out of insurance companies by knowing which boxes to check. Ladies and gentlemen, the ICD-10. Take a bow, Medicare.
My father is a PCP, and I myself work in his office as a receptionist. Medicaid and Medicare are the absolute worst insurers in terms of payouts. They intentionally make the process of documentation so arduous, and the payouts so small, that PCPs don't even bother processing those claims. At least the private insurance companies pay out for the verification that they force physicians to endure. I support the idea behind the ACA but this really article summarizes nicely why it is a poor law. The devil is in the details, and until the system is streamlined and reformed, as the article states, the public is going to face rising costs and a increasing shortage of PCPs.