Jobs / Healthcare / 31-9092.00
Medical Assistants
Perform administrative and certain clinical duties under the direction of a physician. Administrative duties may include scheduling appointments, maintaining medical records, billing, and coding information for insurance purposes. Clinical duties may include taking and recording vital signs and medical histories, preparing patients for examination, drawing blood, and administering medications as directed by physician.
- US jobs
- 817,870
- Median wage
- $45,690 a year
- Job family
- Healthcare
Can agents do the work of medical assistants?
We read the evidence at the level of the job family, Healthcare:
- Task levelPartialOne benchmark, from early 2025. On Stanford's MedAgentBench, where agents do clinical tasks in a simulated electronic health record, the best recorded model completes 69.7% of tasks (Claude 3.5 Sonnet v2). It has no maintained leaderboard, so newer models are not measured. No benchmark in our collection tests work with patients.
- Project levelPartialOnly adjacent evidence. GDPval includes nurses among its 44 occupations. OpenAI reports that GPT-5.5's deliverables won or tied against professionals' work in 84.9% of comparisons across all occupations. No benchmark in our collection tests clinical work over days, such as managing a patient's care.
Benchmarks for the job family
These cover work in healthcare, not always this occupation's tasks.
- 1846 EloClaude Opus 5.5 (Adaptive Reasoning, Max Effort, Default Fallback) · 23 Sep 2026Unrated
Typical tasks
From O*NET 31.0. Core tasks first. Few of these tasks have a benchmark today.
- Interview patients to obtain medical information and measure their vital signs, weight, and height.
- Clean and sterilize instruments and dispose of contaminated supplies.
- Record patients' medical history, vital statistics, or information such as test results in medical records.
- Explain treatment procedures, medications, diets, or physicians' instructions to patients.
- Prepare treatment rooms for patient examinations, keeping the rooms neat and clean.
- Collect blood, tissue, or other laboratory specimens, log the specimens, and prepare them for testing.
- Show patients to examination rooms and prepare them for the physician.
- Help physicians examine and treat patients, handing them instruments or materials or performing such tasks as giving injections or removing sutures.
- Perform routine laboratory tests and sample analyses.
- Greet and log in patients arriving at office or clinic.
- Perform general office duties, such as answering telephones, taking dictation, or completing insurance forms.
- Prepare and administer medications as directed by a physician.
Other job titles for this occupation (42)
Certified Medical Assistant (CMA) · Chiropractor Assistant · Clinical Medical Assistant · Doctor's Assistant · Health Assistant · Ophthalmic Assistant · Ophthalmological Assistant · Optometric Assistant · Outpatient Surgery Assistant · Registered Medical Assistant (RMA) · Autopsy Assistant · Bilingual Medical Assistant · Cardiology Medical Assistant · Chiropractic Assistant · Client Services Coordinator · Clinic Assistant · Clinic Medical Assistant · Dermatology Medical Assistant · Doctor Assistant · Family Medicine Medical Assistant · Health Unit Clerk · Hospital Clinic Assistant · Medical Assistant (MA) · Medical Office Worker · Medical Support Assistant · Medical Technician Assistant (Medical Tech Assistant) · OB/GYN Medical Assistant (Obstetrics and Gynecology Medical Assistant) · Ocular Care Aide · Ophthalmic Aide · Optometric Aide · Optometrist Assistant · Optometry Assistant · Orthopedic Assistant · Orthopedic Medical Assistant · Pediatric Medical Assistant · Physician's Aide · Podiatric Aide · Podiatric Assistant · Podiatrist Assistant · Primary Care Medical Assistant · Respiratory Therapist Assistant · Urgent Care Medical Assistant