I have been an MA for almost 6 years now and have been at the same job since before I graduated. I still make only $9.00 an hour, right here inside California. My pay checks have always been small, and things that may take other people a short amount of time to save up for it takes me much longer (it took me 2 years to save up $5,000 to get Lasix surgery) Nurses in my area make about $20-25/hr. Although that may seem like a lot in respect to my current $9.00/hr I will have a BSN when I graduate and the work you do as a nurse is worth far more than $25/hr. As a low paid medical assistant I learned to enjoy my job for simply what it is; it has nothing to do with pay. Many people in my nursing classes talk about how much money they will be making as nurses and all I can think is how I am going into nursing because I love the medical field and money has nothing NOTHING to do with why I am going into it. If you can not go to work and say "I would be willing to do this for free if I could afford to" then what are you doing there? I can not understand people who make $100,000 a year but hate their jobs. I may make peanuts as an MA but I like what I am doing, and peanuts go good with a mug of beer at the end of a long day
If you can do is complain about how the pay in Medical Assisting "Sucks" get out, your making yourself (and probably those around you too) miserable. Any one who is passionate about the medical field knows that no one is in it for the money (unless your doctor 90210 )

Thanks HeartsOpenWide: Thanks for putting it so well.

Redundancy and straight forth venting frustrations is okay to a point, but in the long run doesn't help much, once we got the point. Not it is time for a positive respose and gentle nudges into the right direction.

You've taken the initiative to start a new topic on an old topic, and have taken the first step put things into the right perspective...

And as far as my locking the other threads... I just felt that enough was enough. We've got the message. Lets all help out, and move forward from here.

Danni R.

Your Professional Title/Credentials: Website Owner/Site Admin

I agree 100%!
I had a woman tell me the other day " You are making a mistake going into nursing, the pay sucks!"
I am in it for the self-satisfaction. This is what i want to do. It excites me. I love my job and that is what matters. yes we all need to pay the bills, but job satisfaction is #1 in my book! Life is too short to hate your job but be in it for the money.

Your Professional Title/Credentials: LPN

Are You Still In School? yes

Are You Working? yes

Totally agree, Tracy.

If you read through the very latest commnets (after I decided to lock the previous ones) it looks to me we are now on the right track again as far as reasons WHY we want to become medical assistants. Not so much, why not. Which is fine... to a point. It just isn't very encouraging to read over and over to those who do see the value of this career and a contemplating it.

I have nothing against moving on and up from the medcal assisting profession, like you and I have done, and so many others here, never forgetting, however, where we bagan the journey, and the people we met and inspired us along the way.

Your Professional Title/Credentials: Website Owner/Site Admin

Here the RN program requires you to have worked as a CNA for at least 1 year. My Wife is an RN. Many times she comes home and tells me how the techs in her area help and make her job easier. One day they were short Techs and she was filling in, the nurse in charge got little or no help from the techs. She said it had to do with how this nurse helped them or in this case failed to assist. Technically they were doing their job and no more.

Low pay will not help nearly as much as perspective. In my last career the Engineers and Managers who were Technicians or production staff were much better at getting folks to step up and get the job done in tough times. The also got waaaaayyyyy more for their effort.

Your Professional Title/Credentials: working on it

Are You Still In School? yes

Are You Working? no