Medical Coding and Billing are also fields to investigate. DH's office pays premium dollars for experienced people. Granted you have to start somewhere - but if you're a quick study you can advance. However this isn't on the job training - you'll have to take classes first.

The medical coding, billing, records stuff is something you can probably take up at your local community college or at one of those commercial schools. Won't cost you too much. But do consider the job. Medical billing/insurance? Do you really, REALLY want to spend your days arguing with insurance companies? and sending people bills for money they probably don't have? Part of DD's job involves medical insurance claims. It's not fun, and a real pain in the neck.

If you really haven't got a clear--"I have ALWAYS wanted to....." career in mind, why don't you get your community college's course book and see what they offer, what things might appeal to you? Look specifically at the tracks that can be done as an apprentice--that way the college helps place you in a job so you learn and earn at the same time. DD didn't do the apprenticeship program to become an optician, but most in her class did, and most of the other students in the program were in their 40's/50's and going for, obviously, second (third? fourth?) careers. Once you've found something that appeals to you, do take the time to chat with someone in the field. Find out what it's REALLY like, what they enjoy about it, what they hate? What it pays, what the opportunities for advancement are (medical billing, etc really doesn't pay much as a job in and of itself, from what I hear).

What about taking something you enjoy and doing it for pay? I contacted the local newspaper when we moved. Much to my surprise, I was IMMEDIATELY hired as a stringer to write food columns. What a fun job! And my columns have even been picked up by other papers! Be creative in thinking about what you might want to do. That newspaper thing doesn't pay me enough to live on, but add something fun like that to your day, and it's a nice little extra. Be creative about thinking how you might expand your horizons in fields you enjoy--and how you might make a few $$$ at it.

I agree about the coding job one of my best friends does that for a living and she is always hating her job there is nothing fun about it at all and you have to be on quota consistently. Plus many of the big companies she has worked for are cutting way back.

Things I would consider if I were starting a career
Florist I would love being around beautiful flowers all day
ultrasound tech or operator
tutor (you can make an amazing amount of money doing this)
One of my friends husband was a school teacher, he decided he was ready to retire but still needed income and something to do and he loves teaching, I suggested he get on the tutor list, he had never thought of that, but did and he makes more now than he did when he was a teacher. But it is on his time and as he wants to. Plus you can choose what to tutor and what grade levels.
Radio personality/dj
Home cooked delivery make home made meals that are delivered to customers for the week. This is an expanding industry especially with people on diets and trying to eat proper foods. Some have a small store front that you can stop by and pick up a meal for that night some only do the weekly delivery there are various options.

Being a florist is very hard work! I did it for many years - it means standing on your feet 8+ hours a day, the pay is minimal and you will get bad arthritis in your hands. Don't even consider it if you're allergic to pollen or pesticides.

You can become a Licensed Practical Nurse in just 9 months, and get financial aid for the $6,000 cost. You can then get on with your area's Visiting Nurses Association or be a school nurse - the pay starts at about $16/hr. You can do a lot with a LPN or CMT license.

In this state, requires more than 9 months (LPN), but if you have a collecge or an adult learning center in your area go and see who you can talk to. Many do have special courses for second careers. Do you have any hobbies that could expand into a job? Do you like working by yourself--with others--young--elderly---? Before you start out, fill out your experiences, hobbies, etc and I am sure you will find something on the internet to help you out also.

I always felt kind of sorry for the medical coders when I worked at the hospital. They were stuck in the basement dealing with tons of information, surrounded by mountains of hanging files. I wonder how all this will change with the new electronic medical records?

I've never been able to come up with an ideal career for me. I'm retired from a career as a professional fund raiser for non-profits. That would have been enjoyable except for the constant worry about meeting goals. That pressure was awful. I started out doing direct mail fund raising and I liked that. I should have stuck with it but there were few opportunities and it is kind of considered the bottom of the fund raising barrel.

I think I would have enjoyed being an admissions counselor, college counselor or career counselor (oddly enough!).

First, does your screen name tell us what your personality is like?

About Coding, etc. There are different "jobs" included in those terms. One size doesn't fit all. My DD is a trained two years at UVA), Radiology Technician and learned MT on the job. She retired two years ago, but was asked to do MT at home, part time, and now is retiring again. Enough is enough, she says.

Every day almost I get emails offering MT training. Have no idea how legitimate those folks are. If you are interested in that, do your research.

And yes, as dedtired mentioned, things are changing. Our hospital, my DD's employer, is in the process of changing to Voice Recognition MT.

Just to be clear, MT in this case is Medical Transcription, which means you are reading a doctor's report, which sometimes has obvious errors. Now with Voice Recognition you will be contending with different accents. It isn't easy, but it does pay well.

Sue

This post was edited by Sue-va on Sun, Feb 10, 13 at 22:20

MizAnnThrope, I don't recognize your name but your post is awfully familiar. Did you post this here last year?

Of course, I could be imagining things. That's always possible. :-)

dil has her own business, doing disibility claims for a large co...she had written a guide-line for the ins co she had worked for, and was hired by a customer who had a huge claim dept...now from home, with her mom and 2 other ladies, she has develope her company...but it all started with her working for a major ins co, first...

the drawbacks? the buck stops at her desk...and she can have as many as 800 claims or more a year...her 6 figure job pays the salery for herself and 3 other people...

Are you good with languages, or particularily proefficient with one foriegn language, there could be a job for you in hospitals and health care providers. There is a demand for interperters who can bridge the language gap between the patient and health provider. One pressing need is a spanish speaking interpreter in the birthing wards.

If you know arabic, spanish, french, or german, and can pass security requirements, there may be a job in one of the various US government offices acting as interpreter and reader of foriegn messages and news articles.

Do you own your home and have space to run a child care center? Check into what is required in your state to become a cetified child care provider. There is money in it, but risks also - you are dealing with other people's kids. Make sure you have proper insurance before you begin.

Thank you all. Keep the comments coming.
I was looking at a job that is a combo of tech & medical records mgmt - entirely diff from coding/billing.
I've actually applied to do some p/t reporting for my local paper. But, time constraints may preclude that.
Ultrasound tech is in demand. Tutor ... hmmm ... I wonder what I'd have to do to qualify for that. I could tutor English. I'd enjoy that.
Yes, Sue, name is telling. I volunteer and have lots of friends, but that's all on my terms. I don't think I could be a teacher or nurse, esp after hearing stories and seeing burnout of friends in these professions.
Nope, Alisande, not me.
Susanjf, I'm jealous of your DIL. Good for her!
No languages, unfortunately.

It might be helpful to know what you do now? Possibly you could use your skills in your current profession to gain new skills.

You'll want to check to see what medical tech jobs pay. Around here, it's in the $10-14/hour range (and that's in one of the highest cost-of-living states). I'd expect, at your stage of life, the idea is to get into something that will enable you to make more than a hair over minimum wage? Why don't you look into opticianry? Don't know what state you're in, and the salaries vary greatly, depending upon the licensing requirements, but in states with higher requirements, you can start at around $18/hour, and go up into the 20's/hour. (DD is making far more with her 2-year optician degree than several friends who have their masters in other fields).

Just, whatever you think about, do find out what the jobs actually pay--a lot of things don't pay nearly as well as you'd think they might.

Jemdandy, how would you find the interpreter jobs? I never see things like that listed. It would be a good lead for my daughter who has learned to speak Spanish.

first I wanted to say I was so happy to see you post, assuming you were around here & Garden Party at the beginning??? It's been a very longtime! I don't have much time to drop by here thou I do read thru the posts about once a week and comment couple times a month.

I can't say much to the coding job, I would recommend a LabTech or Medical Lab Tech field thou. I am interested in changing fields soon, my hearts desire is something along Canine Massage therapy but for $$ sake I may go back to Microbiology area. I would go back to college since it's been 20 yrs since I graduated w plant Sciences-Biology. I want to go back to Microbiology but I don't need to work fulltime and would like to control my schedule more. my sis who has been an MLT for 20+ yrs and is a hospital lab supervisor advised me to go towards Genetics or MLT. I have several friends also in MLT/MT in Chicago & Indy and they make after 20+ yrs $30+ pr hr. Starting is around $15pr hr in big cities like Chicago.

My DH went back to college 10 yrs ago part-time changing from Computer Science to Mechanical Engineer. 5 years ago he quit working to finish his honors BS and start an MS. He completely finished May 2012 while working part-time for 2 yrs as a project engineer for City of Orlando. He just took an awesome job in Tampa for a huge tele-comm co as an Engineering Project Manager. It took 8 months to find and get this job! Job hunting is not for the faint of heart nor those who are in dire financial straits, in the professional world job applicants spend on average 3 months going thru the process per job. We did that for 4 yrs LOL!

I would ONLY recommend going back to school if you KNOW you can make as much $$ in 1 year as you owe in loans. My DH earned an honors BS w a near perfect GPA and had the 2nd highest GPA in the MS program. MOST employers screen resumes by GPA now, even my sis (several friends too who work for this large national co) has been required to submit ALL academic records to her employer from the past 25 yrs, it is now standard practice for future raises. Make sure you can excel at what you choose to make it financially feasible. Good Luck! ~ liz

Thx, Liz. Yes, $$ has to be a - somewhat - driving force for me, unfortunately. Everywhere I look, I see "project management," and someone on another thread suggested I take a course(s) in this area to get a feel for it.

there are online courses to take on "project management" to get a feel for what the job entails. This can be in all sorts of fields too. The company that my DH works for has never had real engineers doing engineering project management and finally decided after years of technical problems that have never be solved to upgrade on their managers. you can't exactly have a non-engineer manager figure out why a cell tower in a hotel attic has never worked in 3 yrs when it involves a specially constructed room (not up to code either LOL) w a stand alone A/C unit... So there are all sorts of project managers, it really is about being organized and figuring out how to efficiently problem solve and get results. My DH manages 176 cell tower installations a month all over the state of FL, mostly reviewing plans, ordering parts, checking on progress of installs and hitting the road to sites when technical problems happen. He has some engineering management education and spent 2 yrs w City of Orlando as project manager. That job he got after he solved a problem they had collecting data, he wrote a program to automatically collect data from remote sensors, compile it and produce a report ea month. They quickly figured out he had the technical knowledge to figure out site problems on converting 100 old city buildings to efficient new A/C units w mega watt back up generators. ~ liz

I am really concerned with your problem.

This post was edited by ella.fisher on Fri, Jul 12, 13 at 6:21

If medical records interest you, you should consider medical coding and billing; itâÂÂs a great field with a promising job outlook. I donâÂÂt know how familiar you are with coding, but currently, coders are using ICD-9 set of codes but this will soon change as later this year, medical centers will switch to a new set of codes, namely the ICD-10. I believe itâÂÂs the right time to enter this field, because the healthcare industry might face a shortage of skilled coders who have knowledge of ICD-10. If youâÂÂre serious about this field, take a look at the online training courses CareerStep offers as part of its corporate programs. YouâÂÂll get more information by visiting their website. Hope this helps!

Nope, no spam, ella.