What Are Some Jobs in the Medical Field?
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reports that more than 14 million people work in the medical field or health care industry, as of 2011. Ten of the top 20 fastest growing professions are in the medical field or are health care related. The BLS also predicts that more than 3 million jobs will be created in the medical field between 2008 and 2018, which is more jobs than any other industry is predicted to create.
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Hospitals
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Most medical industry jobs are in hospitals. The jobs can range from physicians, which require years of education and internships, to nursing assistants or aides, which require very little training and education. Hospitals can be publicly owned and operated, but most are privately owned facilities. Physician assistants, skin care specialists, physical therapists and aides, medical assistants, pharmacy technicians and occupational therapists are all medical field jobs that are projected to grow fast according to 2011 data from the BLS.
Home Health Care
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Home health aides as well as personal and home care aides are at the top of the list of fast growing medical field jobs. Both of these medical jobs require on-the-job training and are expected to grow by more than 45 percent between 2008 and 2018. Home health aides work with disabled individuals, the chronically ill and older adults who may need extra attention and live at home. Most of these medical field jobs are found through private health care firms.
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Private Medical Offices
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Many jobs in the medical field are found in private medical offices such as doctors' offices, dentists' offices and the private offices of physicians who specialize in a particular field and share office space with other medical practitioners. According to the BLS, approximately 36 percent of medical facilities fall into this category, and all of the offices need nurses, billing and coding clerks, filing clerks and other medical aides or personnel. Chiropractors, physical therapists, psychologists, speech-language pathologists and other specialized health care practitioners need support personnel to operate their private offices.
Ambulance Services
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Ambulance services covers more than just the emergency medical technicians (EMTs) who work out of a emergency motor vehicle. This type of medical job can include transport drivers who move laboratory diagnostics and specimens and aircraft pilots, such as helicopter pilots and emergency airplane pilots. Nurses, dispatchers and physicians all work as part of the ambulance service or in the medical transportation industry.
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References
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