HCE or PCE?

[WhitecatBlackcat]

I currently work as a front office assistant in an emergency care clinic. It sees all types of patients but mainly the economically disadvantaged and the elderly. Although I do not treat patients ( as far as injections, vitals, and diagnoses go), I do handle triage, admitting, insurance, medication dispensing, and discharging. Would this work count as HCE? Is there a preference of PCE over HCE? Would I do well as an applicant with over 500+ hours of clerical work? It’s difficult to find direct patient care work in my area without a certification. I do have an MA cert from NHA but no one will hire a MA without several years of experience. I also don’t feel like my program adequately prepared me for work as an MA as far as injections go.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[pamac]

The problem you may run into is deciding how to explain your experience (which I think is actually decent). When you are inputting your information, there might be sections where they require you to pick your healthcare experience from a predetermined list of job categories. What you have might not fit cleanly in there if they only let you pick from among things like EMT, MA, CNA, RN, medic, lab scientist, phlebotomist, radiological tech, respiratory therapy, etc. plenty of schools will like what you have, you just have to research which ones. Schools that have hard core requirements as far as hce wont be interested, and weed out the folks who don’t have those kinds of jobs. The real sticklers don’t even want folks that are CNAs, or any other entry level job path, and only want career level experience.

 

[WhitecatBlackcat]

Do you think it would be a good idea to get an emt cert? There are a few programs in my area that offer it but little to no emt jobs

 

[pamac]

I don’t think it can hurt you, unless it gets in the way of you getting good grades. I always preach “grades first and foremost” because they are the hardest to turn around. But if you can’t use your EMT certification, it’s kind of a waste of time and money that could be spent doing something else to make you look good. It wouldn’t be at the top of my priority list. You pretty much have to rely on your current healthcare experience and find a program that will accept it, and you should be able to.

 

[RDHtoPA]

HCE in my opinion.