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Perform routine medical laboratory tests for the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disease. May work under the supervision of a medical technologist.
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Watch a video to learn more about this career
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Rapid job growth and excellent job opportunities are expected. Most jobs will continue to be in hospitals, but employment will grow faster in other settings.
Employment change. Employment of clinical laboratory workers is expected to grow 14 percent between 2006 and 2016, faster than the average for all occupations. The volume of laboratory tests continues to increase with both population growth and the development of new types of tests.
Technological advances will continue to have opposing effects on employment. On the one hand, new, increasingly powerful diagnostic tests will encourage additional testing and spur employment. On the other, research and development efforts targeted at simplifying routine testing procedures may enhance the ability of nonlaboratory personnelphysicians and patients in particularto perform tests now conducted in laboratories.
Although hospitals are expected to continue to be the major employer of clinical laboratory workers, employment is expected to grow faster in medical and diagnostic laboratories, offices of physicians, and all other ambulatory health care services.
Job prospects. Job opportunities are expected to be excellent because the number of job openings is expected to continue to exceed the number of job seekers. Although significant, job growth will not be the only source of opportunities. As in most occupations, many additional openings will result from the need to replace workers who transfer to other occupations, retire, or stop working for some other reason.
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Clinical laboratory technologists and technicians held about 319,000 jobs in 2006. More than half of jobs were in hospitals. Most of the remaining jobs were in offices of physicians and in medical and diagnostic laboratories. A small proportion was in educational services and in all other ambulatory health care services.
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Job Zone 2 - Some preparation
In these occupations you can often use your knowledge and skills to help others.
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Overall Experience
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Some previous work-related skill, knowledge, or experience maybe helpful in
these occupations, but usually is not needed. For example, a drywall installer
could benefit from experience in installing dry wall, but an inexperienced
person could learn the job fairly easily.
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Education
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These occupations usually require a high school diploma and may require some
vocational training or job related course work. In some cases, you may need an
associate's or bachelor's degree.
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Job Training
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Employees in these occupations need anywhere from a few months to one year of
working with experienced employees.
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Examples
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Drywall installers, fire inspectors, flight attendants, pharmacy technicians,
retail salespersons, and bank tellers.
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For a list of accredited and approved educational programs for clinical laboratory personnel, contact:
- National Accrediting Agency for Clinical Laboratory Sciences, 8410 W. Bryn Mawr Ave., Suite 670, Chicago, IL 60631. Internet: http://www.naacls.org
Information on certification is available from:
- American Association of Bioanalysts, Board of Registry, 906 Olive St., Suite 1200, St. Louis, MO 63101. Internet: http://www.aab.org
- American Medical Technologists, 10700 Higgins Rd., Suite 150, Rosemont, IL 60018. Internet: http://www.amt1.com
- American Society for Clinical Pathology, 33 West Monroe Street, Suite 1600, Chicago, IL 60603. Internet: http://www.ascp.org
- National Credentialing Agency for Laboratory Personnel, P.O. Box 15945, Lenexa, KS 66285. Internet: http://www.nca-info.org
Additional career information is available from:
- American Association of Blood Banks, 8101 Glenbrook Rd., Bethesda, MD 20814. Internet: http://www.aabb.org
- American Society for Clinical Laboratory Science, 6701 Democracy Blvd., Suite 300, Bethesda, MD 20817. Internet: http://www.ascls.org
- American Society for Cytopathology, 400 West 9th St., Suite 201, Wilmington, DE 19801. Internet: http://www.cytopathology.org
- Clinical Laboratory Management Association, 989 Old Eagle School Rd., Suite 815, Wayne, PA 19087. Internet: http://www.clma.org
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Sources: O*Net data version 12.0
Occupational Outlook Handbook
Department of Labor
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