Looking For Info About Medical Externship?The final step in most training programs for medical assistants is the medical externship. This is a great way to practice and solidify the skills that are learned in the classroom and gain valuable experience in the day to day duties of medical assistants. A medical externship is like a short internship. The student gets a position in an office and works for free for a short time (usually around 160 hours or so) in order to get some on the job training. Schools with medical assistant training programs usually have a list of offices which are willing to host students for their medical externship. Students can express a preference for a certain type of position, but are not guaranteed their first choice. They go to the office where they are trying to obtain a medical externship and interview with their potential supervisor to determine whether the position will be a good fit, and if so they are offered the position. As a part of their medical externship, medical assistant students should be given typical medical assistant tasks in order to help with their training. They should not be given busy work or left with nothing to do as this does not consist of a learning opportunity unless they are given the same types of tasks they would have as a medical assistant. While participating in a medical externship, medical assistant students need to be sure to behave in a professional manner, dress appropriately, ask questions, complete any task assigned no matter how small, maintain confidentiality and follow any office policies. The student is doing the medical externship to learn, and it is their responsibility to make sure that this happens. They need to show the skills that they have learned during their classroom studies, but they also need to be sure to take advantage of the medical externship as an opportunity to learn more about their chosen career and gain valuable skills. During the medical externship, the supervisor evaluates the student and passes this evaluation on to the student's school, where it is used to give valuable feedback to the student. Evaluations are usually turned in to the school in the middle of the medical externship and at the end of the medical externship. At the end of the medical externship, as long as the externship has gone well, students should pass on their resume and contact information to the hiring manager at the office where they have done their medical externship and ask to be contacted if a position should open up. This frequently leads to job offers either from the organization where the externship was done or other offices that they might pass your information on to. |