NHS clinical coder

[monicagellerbing]

I'm thinking of applying for this role in my local GP surgery. I've been a medical secretary for over 20 years but am looking for something part time and more flexible now, and this job has come up. I'm worried it'll be boring however. Has anyone done this job and can offer any insight?

Used to manage clinical coders back in the day. I'll admit I found it fascinating but it does take a certain type of person. Basically the clinical coders job is to summarise in a code format what has happened to each patient and their diagnosis. So patient X has urine test, antibiotics prescribed for a UTI - bit simplistic but you get the idea. Delving into medical records, discharge summaries for the information.

My team were hospital based so wider range of patients, treatments and outcomes. The information gathered is used to allocate budgets, forward planning etc. In GPs surgeries it's possibly used for payments too.

As I say some will find it fascinating, others not. I would have thought medical secretarial work a good background for clinical coding but you might find less varied on a day to day basis.

I only heard of clinical coding on Mumsnet from another thread. It does sound interesting, but I worry it may be taken over by AI.

Only if and when AI can read doctor's handwriting! Much of NHS patient records are still paper based

Even after AI takes over we'll still need coders to validate the input and stop it hallucinating. There's loads of opportunities and jobs in health analytics will become much more efficient and interesting from everything I see. I work in this field and we're a million miles away from getting rid of people. We need Cloud and AI expertise desperately!

This sounds absolutely fascinating, could I learn to do this?

https://www.stepintothenhs.nhs.uk/careers/clinical-coder Go for it! I've worked for the nhs for 3 years now and shifted into data. It's been the best move I've made. Great people, relatively secure and fascinating. I'm on data side rather than coding but without good coding the data is useless!

Thank you @DPotter I think the best thing for me is to just give it a go! It's only part time so hopefully won't get too repetitive.

Good luck !!