Curriculum
Thompson Career College is partnering with Career Step in the use of their online curriculum. This curriculum has been offered successfully to students for the past 16 years, and the curriculum adheres to guidelines provided by the Association for Healthcare Documentation Integrity (AHDI).
The online curriculum provides online materials, interactive exercises, hundreds of transcription audio files, an online transcription environment, online tests for each module, and chat rooms for interacting with instructors / student counselors, and other students.
Each student is provided with a personalized account for accessing the curriculum. This account tracks the student's progress through the curriculum modules, and records the results from all tests / assessments taken by the student.
The online curriculum guides the student through the various course modules. Online meetings / chats are scheduled regularly where students working in the same module meet with an instructor / student counselor to discuss issues with the module.
Hundreds of students have successfully completed the program over the past 16 years.
Modules vary in length; some are quite long and contain many units, and other modules are short and contain only a few units. An outline and brief description of each module is provided below to give you an overview of the program.
Program Orientation
Introduction to the course: Familiarizes students with the basic tools that will help them get the most effective training. Tips on navigating the course, getting help, course structure and order, references and online audio.
Technology and the Medical Professional
The purpose of this module is to teach basic computer skills, including using hardware, software, peripherals, and wireless technology, utilizing the Internet as a resource, and operating various facilities for data storage and networking. The student will learn about the many software and hardware products available specifically developed for the healthcare environment.
Keyboard Kinetics
The purpose of this module is to teach the student keyboard basics-which fingers are supposed to touch which keys-and help the student gain efficiency on the keyboard. In other words, this module should help the student type faster!
Medical Word Building
The purpose of this module is to teach medical word building, including root words, combining forms, prefixes, and suffixes.
Grammar and Punctuation
This module is a refresher of basic English grammar and punctuation rules. The student will be able to recognize and identify proper usage and correctly punctuate sentences.
Anatomy and Disease
The purpose of this module is to introduce the student to basic human anatomical structures and the various diseases that affect them. The student will be introduced to disease entities, diagnoses, and treatments.
Pathophysiology
The purpose of this module is to familiarize the student with the major body systems-the digestive, respiratory, endocrine, reproductive, excretory, cardiovascular, nervous, and musculoskeletal systems-and the diseases associated with them.
Mastering Medical Language
The purpose of this module is to educate the student in the specialized vocabulary used by healthcare providers and to a variety of nuances specific to medical language. Specifically, this module will cover word differentiation, abbreviations, plurals, foreign terms, and slang and jargon in medical language.
Pharmacology
This purpose of this module is to introduce the student to the science of pharmacology and provide an overview of basic pharmacologics, including drug actions and effects, absorption, distribution, metabolism and excretion, and drug classifications and formulary. This module also gives the student the opportunity to see and reference pharmaceutical terms in the context of medical reports with exposure to commonly prescribed drugs.
Building the Medical Record
The purpose of this module is to educate the student on how to build the medical record. Specifically, the module will cover report types, report components, formatting rules, and effective resources. The physical exam and laboratory data report components will be studied in detail in this module.
Diagnostic Reports
The purpose of this module is to expose the student to diagnostic reports. The student will take an in-depth look at emergency medicine, physical medicine, radiology, and pathology. Each unit will contain terminology, headings, exercises, and sample reports.
Focus on Medical Specialties
The purpose of this module is to introduce the student to the various types of reports a medical transcriptionist transcribes and provide an opportunity to study reports in depth across every major medical specialty. This module will expose the student to specialty-specific information, including terminology, abbreviations, types of reports, and document formatting through sample reports, varied exercises, targeted curriculum, and word lists.
Midterm
The purpose of this module is to provide an opportunity for self-assessment after completion of the objective modules and before moving on to the practical components in the training program.
Perfect the Text
The purpose of this module is to improve editing skills by reviewing related editing and proofreading problem areas, including commonly misspelled words, fragments and run-on sentences, punctuation, capitalization, incorrect words, and dictation that needs to be "cleaned up."
Introduction to Transcription
The purpose of this module is to provide the student with the fundamentals of transcription, with tips and exercises designed to facilitate a smoother transition into the transcription practicum portion of the training program. In addition, this module includes a brief preparatory transcription practicum in order to help the student gradually step into medical transcription.
Clinic Notes
The purpose of this module is to provide practical experience transcribing authentic clinic note dictation. This module includes a wide variety of clinic notes and progress notes across various specialties including, but not limited to, cardiology, dermatology, endocrinology, otorhinolaryngology, GI, GU, neurology, OB/GYN, oncology, ophthalmology, orthopedic, pediatrics, podiatry, primary care, and psychology.
Enhancing Productivity
The purpose of this module is to provide information and exercises for tracking and improving productivity, along with tips for preparing to be productive on the job after graduation. This unit also provides extensive descriptions of productivity tools, software commonly used in the medical transcription industry, and a 4-month free trial of a word expander software to be used in the training program.
Basic Acute Care
The purpose of this practicum module is to provide practical experience transcribing authentic acute care dictation files. This module includes basic hospital reports, including radiology, emergency room (ER), multispecialty clinic, discharge summaries, operative reports, procedure notes, consultations, and history and physicals, with account instructions to follow.
Advanced Acute Care
The purpose of this practicum module is to expose the student to a wide sampling of account instructions and acute care files with a high level of difficulty. The module is broken down into an in-depth account instructions unit, verbatim instructions unit, radiology unit, complex account instructions unit, and an extremely advanced acute care unit. All dictation is authentic, and the full spectrum of dictator accents and dictation style is covered. The practicum files cover radiology reports, operative reports, consultations, history and physicals, ER reports, discharge summaries, procedure notes, and progress notes.
Final Exam Preparation
The purpose of this module is to provide final exam information, including an overview of the final, tips for preparing for the final, scheduling the final, and accessing the final examination.
Speech Recognition
The purpose of this module is to educate the student regarding speech recognition technology's role in the health information management industry. This module addresses common myths associated with the emergence of SRT , the history of SRT , and how SRT works. This is a conceptual module designed to give the student a working understanding of the speech recognition engine and how medical transcriptionists and medical editors fit into SRT . |
