Health Information Technology Job Description

What you'll do as a Health Information Technician: You'll manage, analyze and organize patient medical records and databases for statistical reports and studies. You'll design and manage health information systems to ensure they meet medical, legal and ethical standards and see that each patient's medical record is complete, confidential and safeguarded.

Degree you'll need: Associate's degree

Median annual salary range: $25,570 – $42,170

Cities where jobs are often found: Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, Houston, Phoenix, Boston
_{Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2010}

Health information technology programs vary from school to school, but most programs cover the following topics:

• Medical terminology
• Anatomy and physiology
• Legal aspects of health information
• Coding and abstraction of data
• Computer science

Most employers prefer to hire Registered Health Information Technicians (RHIT) or Registered Health Information Administrators (RHIA), who have passed the written certification examinations offered by the American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA).

In order to qualify to take either the RHIT or RHIA examination, a person must graduate from a 2-year associate degree program accredited by the Commission on Accreditation for Health Informatics and Information Management Education (CAHIIM). Health information technicians who receive their training on the job or from non-CAHIIM-accredited programs are not eligible to take the examination.