About being a Medical Laboratory Technician
This is a video that talks about being a medical laboratory technician. I thought it might be nice to actually see a few medical laboratory technicians in action instead of just reading my writing about them.
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The Benefits a Medical Laboratory Technician May See from Automated Urinalysis
Urinalysis can be quite time consuming for medical laboratory technicians. Although some labs have begun automating urinalysis, many medical laboratory technicians are still doing confirmatory tests and microscopy by hand. Those medical laboratory technologists know how much time doing urinalysis by hand can take and how it can swamp a whole laboratory.
Many laboratories don’t have enough resources to have one medial laboratory technician on staff solely for doing urinalysis. As a result, medical laboratory technicians doing other things would be forced to put those tasks on hold to finish the urinalyses.
Automating urinalysis allows a laboratory to keep on the same number of medical laboratory technicians while being able to perform even more urinalysis. Urinalysis technology can be pricey, but medical laboratory technicians are seeing that the technology has gotten much better and cheaper in recent years. Automated urinalysis is also better quality than manual urinalysis done by medical laboratory technicians. Not because medical laboratory technicians don’t do a great job, but because the urinalysis machines are able to take 500 photos of each specimen, compared to the 10-15 that medical laboratory technicians are able to take when manually doing the urinalysis. Another benefit to automation is that results can actually be reported without the involvement of a medical laboratory technician. This can be done if a medical laboratory technician enters a few parameters into the machine before the specimen in analyzed.
The benefits seem clear to automating urinalysis. Once the hurdle of the high cost of a machine can be cleared, a medical laboratory technician should see the lab they work for prosper as a result of automation.
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Atwell, Jim (January 28, 2008) Knocking Down Inefficiency With Automated Urinalysis. Advance for Medical Laboratory Professionals, page 33-35.
Certification for a Medical Laboratory Technician
Figuring out how to get certified and by whom can be a bit of a process for a medical laboratory technician. There are several certification agencies who a medical laboratory technician can be certified by, and each one has a slightly different process.
To get certified by the American Association of Bioanalysts medical laboratory technicians must get re-validated every year for certification. It costs 95 dollars to get re-validated each year for a medical laboratory technician. If a medical laboratory technician does not get re-validated for three or more years, then it is required that the person must take the examinations again and pay a 180 dollar fee to become reinstated.
American Medical Technologists will require medical laboratory technicians to take the American medical technician exam unless the person has already passed a general medical laboratory technician exam as well as passed a medical laboratory technician exam for state licensure. After a medical laboratory technician has passed the required tests, they must apply to become certified. Medical laboratory technicians need to re-certify every three years by earning 45 continuing education points.
American Society for Clinical Pathology required medical laboratory technicians to re-certify every three years and pay a 50 dollar fee. In order to re-certify a medical laboratory technician must earn 36 hours of continuing education. If a member waits longer than three years to re-certify, they are still able to as long as it hasn’t been more than ten years, if they submit documentation showing they have completed their continuing education points and if they pay the reinstatement fee.
The National Credentialing Agency for laboratory personnel also certifies medical laboratory technicians. Medical laboratory technicians must be re-certified every three years after earning at least 36 hours of continuing education and paying a 75 dollar re-certification fee.
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Source:
Montgomery, Kelly A. (December 31, 2007) Learn the Ins and Outs of Clinical Laboratory Licensure, Certification and Specialties. Advance for Medical Laboratory Professionals.
