Practicode Course| Should I Get Certified First? – Video

Q: [Coding Experience] How do you break into the field? Should I get certified first? I had the CPC in 2007. Now I am wanting to make a career of this but need the practical experience. What would you advise me to do?

A: Yes, definitely get certified because that’s what employers want. They want to see that you’re certified. They also want to see experience, so if you don’t have that, then we recommend Practicode. We have a course designer that we call the course, but it’s a practicum. Basically, you go in, we map out the cases that we want you to do if you want to become proficient at say ortho or OB-GYN or E/M, the different specialties that they currently have. You go in and you code as quick as you can, like you pretend like it’s a real job, you’re a remote coder.

Practicode Course | Should I Get Certified First? – Video

Practicode is really based off of Aviacode software that their remote coders use to code for their clients. It’s a scaled-down version. They’ve told us, the Aviacode folks that your scores are tracked. So if you want to know your proficiency score, if it reaches a certain point for specialty they need, they will hire you. They don’t really care that you were certified last month. They do want you certified but if your proficiency in “ABC” specialty is at 95% or whatever their threshold is, they’re going to hire you because you know what you’re doing obviously and it’s their own system.

You can also, through our course, we’ll write a letter for you to say that you’ve taken our practicum and that you’ve reached level of proficiency at 96% or whatever it is, and you can put that in your portfolio as you go and apply for jobs. It’s really great because it is true real cases that remote coders do. If it’s a remote coding case and you’re working face-to-face in a doctor’s office, it’s the same cases; it’s just not in an online interface we do it on paper. So, it’s great, real world experience.

Boyd: Can I just put a link into the chat right now for Practicode course?

Laureen: Oh, thanks. Yeah.

Q: Do you have to have a certification to be employed as a coder

A: It’s really up to the employer. Some employers will kind of promote from within and lots and lots of people I’ve heard start of as a receptionist, then they did a little billing and then they got pulled into coding, then they got doing auditing and they don’t have any credentials. And then, they get bought by some owner, they get bigger, and they want their staff to get credentialed. So, it really depends. If someone is looking at 25 applications and half of them aren’t certified, I’m going to tend to go with the ones that are certified, that’s just me.

Q: Is there a time limit on fracture codes? Like I waited 3 weeks to get my fracture treated?

A personal question?

Alicia: There’s not a time limit on fracture code.

Laureen: If you’re talking about acute versus, like, a late effect, they pretty much define that period as when the initial days of treatment is over. You might have to re-word that one for us in the forum.

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AAPC – Practicode