
A clinical coder—also known as clinical coding officer, diagnostic coder, medical coder, or nosologist—is a health information professional whose main duties are to analyse clinical statements and assign standard codes using a classification system.
A day as a clinical coder:
You work at your local NHS hospital and begin at 9am. You and your team record information about every patient who visits your hospital, investigating all aspects of their journey from start to finish.
You begin by recording the stay of an elderly woman who had a hip operation two days ago. From her medical notes, you find out the ward she stayed on before surgery, how long her operation took, her recovery time and any other treatment she received. Then you use the special alphanumeric code you've been trained in and record everything on the computer system.
These records can be understood throughout the NHS and used to plan for future patient care. You love the detective element of your job and learning about healthcare and new treatments means work is always interesting.