BACOLOD CITY, (PNA) — Twenty-four trainees of the medical transcription course offered by the provincial government-run Negros Occidental Language and Information Technology Center (NOLITC) received their certificates of completion during their graduation rites Monday.
The 24 graduates, mostly registered nurses, comprise the pioneering batch who started their two-month training last Aug. 17.
The graduation ceremony was attended by Gov. Alfredo Maranon Jr. and Vice Gov. Eugenio Jose Lacson, who launched the Med Trans program in July this year.
Industry leaders have cited the prospects awaiting the medical transcription sector that is expected to be a -billion industry with the approval of the “Affordable Care Act” also known as “Obamacare” of the United States government.
Citing industry figures, Japhet Masculino, head of the Economic Enterprise Development Department, said that currently, at least 50,000 Filipinos are gainfully employed in the Med Trans sector whose demand is expected to reach 100,000 more by 2016.
Dr. Arnulfo “Jun” Seares, owner of the Pronto Medics Transcription that currently employs 120 medical transcriptionists in the Philippines, supported Masculino’s projections, saying that with the Obamacare, doctors in the United States are expected to double the number of their patients.
This will result in more medical records being dictated by physicians, medical clinics and hospitals, and they need to be transformed into Word documents by the medical transcriptionists, he added.
NOLITC head Ma. Cristina Basa-Orbecido said that 100 percent of the graduates have passed their National Competency Assessment Examinations for new medical transcriptionists conducted by the Technical Education Skills and Development Authority.
Several of them are already employed as medical transcriptionists, she added.