“Medical assistants who can work in doctors’ offices are like gold right now,” said Diana Johnson, AA, CMA, and director of the medical assistant program at the San Jacinto College North Campus. “Our students are earning, after completing their externships at the end of a year’s program, from $14 to $16 an hour.
“The pay has been increasing, due in part to the demand as well as the increase and complexity in job responsibilities.”
Johnson, who was a medical assistant for 30 years prior to beginning teaching in 2002, when the San Jac medical assisting program began, said she became a medical assistant because she wanted to work in a physician’s office.
Medical assistants work in the front office, which is the clinical part of the practice, including working with patients, conducting procedures under the physician’s supervision, and assisting with examinations. The back office, in which assistants also receive training, includes working with insurance coding, scheduling patients, handling patient accounts and other clerical duties, according to the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics.
