At work, my biggest challenges are infectious diseases and oncology.

There are sooo many aspects to this course that it's hard to pick hardest, easiest, or most interesting. Certainly keeps one on their toes and one's life interesting!

Good topic!

D NNA

Barbara R

I am at the very end of Module II, and I would have to say that Orthopedics has been the toughest so far. Cardiology would definitely be second on my list. I am working on General Medicine right now, and I am enjoying it.

I do remember thinking at the time that Module I was difficult, but when you are through with it, you realize how much you have learned. That is the best feeling!! Looking back on all the tough things and saying "WOW, I did it!!!"

My opinions could change when I begin
Module III, I'll let you know!!

Deann

PaulaD

WELL, let's see. Regarding your ears, they WILL get better, I promise! In fact, they'll get so much better that you will be able to "pick up" new doctors faster than you ever have. The more you do this, the faster your ears adjust to new dictations styles and new accents.

Don't beat yourself up if you can't get something while trying to hear a difficult portion of dictation. You will get stressed if you fret over it. The more stressed you get, the less efficient your ears work; they become total mush and the sounds are just gobbeldy-gook! To this day, if I stress over what a doctor is saying, rest assured I will NOT be able to figure it out. But if I relax, it comes to me, as if magic happened.

Every now and then, I have what I call a "stupid-ear" day. It just happens. We all have them. It's normal. Don't sweat it. You still have to work on those days, but you can get through it just fine.

Well, I guess I have no other words of wisdom for now.....

D NNA

[This message has been edited by Donna2 (edited 03-12-2001).]

MOD I, Can you believe that I don't really remember? hee hee I remember that this seemed to be the longest...I remember the BIG RED heavy book that kept falling...the little blue book that I could never seem to find what I was looking for in until I was looking something else up...reading the old posts and really being encouraged that my struggles were common. Being frustrated with the fact that "I didn't know everything." Ego ballon buster...

MOD II, I went in really frustrated because of the format changes...I found that I do not like change very much. Once I got over that I clicked right along. This was the fastest and easiest portion of the course for me. There was that one report on that one assessment that was a real bugger... I really liked the operative reports.

MOD III, I found the most difficult Orthopedics. Believe it or not, it is not harder but everything was really unfamiliar which made it difficult. Cardiology was hard because I could not find some of the test information readily...I found all the others challenging but not as difficult as Ortho or Cardiology. I finally learned to quit guessing!

The hardest thing for me in this course was to let go of what I "thought" I knew and let someone else "teach" me. I am kind of sensitive and tend to wear my heart on my sleeve, so some of the comments on my assessments felt like a crushing blow...mind you it was because I put so much into the assessment and just couldn't imagine anything being wrong...

After testing for just two companies, I really am glad that I went through this course. I would not have passed those tests because I would not have questioned every term, every comma placement, every *little* word like *by* verses *via* ect...

Rosemary and RedPen are great coaches...they know when to push you to a good burn and when to apply a little balm to the hurting ego. Missy and Linda are great too because they are always there with a cold glass of encouragement just when you think you are going to faint or even a little bit of chocolate sweet words of advice when you are thinking of throwing in the towel.

Enjoy the course!
Paula R.

Signed but not read! LOL!

[This message has been edited by Lisa W (edited 03-12-2001).]

Starting in Module III, I hated cardiology. It was a bear and I didn't like it at all. I did enjoy orthopedics though.

Module II, that entire section was a bear. I still wonder how in the world I got through it. Surgery was the hardest I think because it seemed like ever few minutes of tape I was looking something up.

Module I and general: Well, like Paula, I have a hard time remembering back that far but I can remember the stupidest thing I have ever done. I was transcribing along thinking I was doing okay when all of a sudden it dawned on me that instead of putting the punctuation for period (.), I was spelling it out!

I will never forget that. Talk about baby MT ears? Thankfully, I haven't done that since then. It just goes to show that we are all human and there is a big change that takes place between getting that first box and finishing up the last one.

I will add that my biggest problem with the entire transcription section was that I listened too hard. Poor Linda, Rosemary, and Redpen told me this so many times it's a wonder they didn't strangle me long before module III. I listened for every ah, mm, and oww. Over time, I learned to ignore, for lack of a better word, the grunts and groans that come from dictators and started to listen to the actual dictation itself. I still have some problems now even over a year after graduation but I can say that it isn't as often as before. Your ears do tune into the important stuff and they do leave the ohhs, ahhs, and umms, on the wayside. You do learn to transcribe the medical work, not the dictators lack of voice and diction skills.

Sam

Other than that, Mod III Ortho was hard for me, and I was not too fond of Pathology.

Janet

Bev

Carrie

I love the food in the teeth comment! That is exactly how I feel, but please don't get the pliers out though...gentle...gentle! LOL!

Paula R.

I like this thread too. It was therapeutic. I just sighed. Now I can go transcribe!

Susan

But I have to say too that I am not real fond of Pathology. It is not hard, but I find it to be very boring. I enjoyed the autopsies. (Well gee, that sounds really sick! ) The rest of it...well, I have to force myself to do them.

Mary

JoanO