Medical Support Assistant-Mental Health

Clarification from the agency

Open to current permanent Department of Veterans Affairs employees, current permanent Federal employees of other agencies and all US Citizens. NOTE: The 2-page Resume requirement does not apply to this position.

Total Rewards of a Allied Health Professional

The position requires the incumbent to physically report for work to the St. Cloud, MN VAMC.

Major duties include, but are not limited to, the following:

• The MSA is tasked with performing intermediate clerical and administrative duties associated with patient care and treatment, such as scheduling, canceling, and rescheduling appointments, interpreting, verifying provider orders, and managing patient records. This role involves greeting visitors, answering phone calls, recording messages, and directing inquiries appropriately while ensuring compliance with HIPAA regulations. These tasks are executed under close supervision to maintain the accuracy and integrity of handling sensitive information.
• Acts as a receptionist, handling incoming and outgoing calls, recording messages, directing calls and visitors, and conveying information appropriately
• Demonstrates positive people skills that reflect caring, service orientation, professionalism, understanding, helpfulness, and concern toward Veterans, visitors, and other employees. Ability to communicate effectively and professionally with people of all educational backgrounds.
• Utilizes basic medical terminology to ensure that Veterans and other callers are directed to the most appropriate place of assistance. Participates in team huddles/meetings, sharing information and collaborating with the medical team to ensure continuity of care.
• Serves as an agent in the department for scheduled and unscheduled visits.
• Maintains flexibility in adapting to changes in schedule and workload. Assists other team members willingly. Responsible for scheduling, canceling, and rescheduling appointments, interpreting, and verifying provider orders according to VHA National scheduling guidelines and facility policies. Provides support to the Behavioral Health and Interdisciplinary Program (BHIP) and other specialty staff.
• Demonstrates the ability to multi-task in high-pressure situations and prioritize changing workflows accordingly. Assists with tasks such as obtaining office supplies, dealing with medical data, scanning, making copies, faxing, and distributing mail. Enters appropriate information into the Veterans electronic medical record. Adheres to HIPAA regulations and ensures that Veteran information is shared only on a need-to-know basis.
• Promptly and accurately initiates and checks on status of referrals, lab, and imaging procedures. Updates Veteran's demographic information to include the following: address, phone number, insurance, preferred method of communication, guardianship reminder, and other information as new programs are added or changed.
• Receives and responds to inquiries via Secure Messaging, Message Manager, VAR, VEText, letters, or phone calls. These can include getting information to Veteran care teams through the entry of a note into the CPRS system and alerting the appropriate clinical staff member, requesting tests or medications, questions on appointments, scheduling, and various other inquiries.
• Demonstrates high proficiency in using computer systems and office procedures, ensuring detailed and accurate data entry and record-keeping. Acts as the main point of contact for queries and manages complex patient data utilizing systems like ISS, VISTA, CPRS, Insurance Capture Buffer (ICB), Consult Tracking Manager (CTM), and Outlook.
• Make numerous calls each day to coordinate information and actions relating to patient care and services. Relays information and requests from the patients and /or clinical services to the treatment team.

Work Schedule: Monday-Friday, 7:30am-4:00pm OR 8:00am-4:30pm, to be discussed in interview
Recruitment/Relocation Incentives (Sign-on Bonus): Not Authorized
Permanent Change of Station (Relocation Assistance): Not Authorized
Pay: Competitive salary and regular salary increases
Paid Time Off: 37-50 days of annual paid time offer per year (13-26 days of annual leave, 13 days of sick leave, 11 paid Federal holidays per year)
Parental Leave: After 12 months of employment, up to 12 weeks of paid parental leave in connection with the birth, adoption, or foster care placement of a child.
Child Care Subsidy: After 60 days of employment, full time employees with a total family income below $144,000 may be eligible for a childcare subsidy up to 25% of total eligible childcare costs for eligible children up to the monthly maximum of $416.66.
Retirement: Traditional federal pension (5 years vesting) and federal 401K with up to 5% in contributions by VA
Insurance: Federal health/vision/dental/term life/long-term care (many federal insurance programs can be carried into retirement)
Telework: Not Available
Virtual: This is not a virtual position.
Functional Statement #: 000000
Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Not Authorized

Conditions of employment

• You must be a U.S. Citizen to apply for this job.
• Selective Service Registration is required for males born after 12/31/1959.
• Must be proficient in written and spoken English.
• Subject to background/security investigation.
• Selected applicants will be required to complete an online onboarding process. Acceptable form(s) of identification will be required to complete pre-employment requirements (https://www.uscis.gov/i-9-central/form-i-9-acceptable-documents). Effective May 7, 2025, driver's licenses or state-issued identification cards that are not REAL ID compliant cannot be utilized as an acceptable form of identification for employment.
• Participation in the seasonal influenza vaccination program is a requirement for all Department of Veterans Affairs Health Care Personnel (HCP).
• Complete all application requirements detailed in the "Required Documents" section of this announcement.

As a condition of employment for accepting this position, you will be required to serve a 1 or 2-year trial period during which we will evaluate your fitness and whether your continued employment advances the public interest. In determining if your employment advances the public interest, we may consider:

• your performance and conduct;
• the needs and interests of the agency;
• whether your continued employment would advance organizational goals of the agency or the Government; and
• whether your continued employment would advance the efficiency of the Federal service.

Upon completion of your trial period, your employment will be terminated unless you receive certification, in writing, that your continued employment advances the public interest.

Qualifications

***KSA Recommendation - All qualifying experience you possess must be clearly described in your application package. We will not make assumptions when reviewing applications. Failure to demonstrate your experience and knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) in your application may result in disqualification. It is strongly recommended that you write to each KSA (found below) to demonstrate how you have gained each one in your application package or on a supplemental document.

***Creditable Experience: Knowledge of MSA Practices. To be creditable, the experience must have demonstrated the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) associated with current MSA responsibilities [or an equivalent administrative patient support role in a non-VA medical inpatient or outpatient setting]. Experience satisfying this requirement may be paid/non-paid employment as [an] MSA or [an equivalent position in a non-VA hospital or clinic setting].

Basic Requirements:

• Citizenship: Be a citizen of the United States (U.S.). Non-citizens may be appointed when it is not possible to recruit qualified citizens according to 38 U.S.C. § 7407(a).
• Experience. No experience required.
• Education. High school diploma, General Education Development equivalency certificate, or proficiency certificate from a State or territorial-level Board or Department of Education.
• Licensure/Certification/Registration. None
• Physical Requirements. See VA Directive and Handbook 5019, Employee Occupational Health Service for requirements. See VA Directive and Handbook 5019, Employee Occupational Health Service for requirements.
• English Language Proficiency. Candidates must be proficient in spoken and written English in accordance with 38 U.S.C. § 7403(f)

GRADE DETERMINATION:

GS-3 MSA (Entry Level)

You must meet the Basic Requirements outlined above.

GS-4 MSA (Developmental Level)

1. Experience. One year of creditable experience equivalent to the next lower grade.

OR

2. Education. One year of education above high school. (Transcripts Required)

AND

Demonstrated Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities.
In addition to Basic Requirements and the experience listed above, candidates must be able to demonstrate all of the KSAs below:

1. Knowledge of basic medical terminology to assist in the provision of care to patients.
2. Skill in recording patient messages and understanding physician requests pertaining to follow-up medical care in internal or external clinics.
3. Ability to meet, communicate, and interact with individuals from varying backgrounds and other health care team members in a courteous and helpful manner in order to facilitate medical care for patients.
4. Ability to use, and navigate between, various types of office automation equipment and software (i.e. computer systems, web based scheduling programs; insurance collection system; scanning software, multiple line phone systems; electronic faxing programs) to support patient care.

GS-5 MSA (Full Performance Level)

1. Experience: One year of creditable experience equivalent to the next lower grade.

OR

2. Education. Two years of education above high school. (Transcripts Required)

AND

Demonstrated Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities.
In addition to Basic Requirements and the experience listed above, candidates must be able to demonstrate all of the KSAs below:

1. Advanced knowledge of medical terminology specific to understand medical diagnosis and procedures sufficient to communicate clinical staff instructions to patients.
2. Skill in customer service with the ability to identify customer concerns, and refer to the appropriate staff as necessary, to ensure a satisfactory resolution.
3. Ability to operate computerized programs and systems in order to enter, modify, and retrieve sensitive medical and patient identifying information (PII) into or from electronic health records, scheduling systems, and/or reports.
4. Ability to schedule medical appointments in a clinical setting.
5. Ability to work independently in the accomplishment of a wide variety of duties performing patient support work.
6. Ability to communicate effectively and professionally in person, electronically, and/or by telephone, with internal and external customers.

Preferred Experience: Mental Health experience preferred.

Reference: For more information on this qualification standard, please visit https://www.va.gov/ohrm/QualificationStandards/.

The full performance level of this vacancy is GS-5. The actual grade at which an applicant may be selected for this vacancy is in the range of GS-3 to GS-5.

Physical Requirements: You will be asked to participate in a pre-employment examination or evaluation as part of the pre-employment process for this position. Questions about physical demands or environmental factors may be addressed at the time of evaluation or examination.

How you will be evaluated

You will be evaluated for this job based on how well you meet the qualifications above.

Area of Consideration-Eligible applications will be reviewed and referred in the following order:
1. Current permanent VA employees of the facility.
2. All other VA employees.
3. Current permanent Federal employees of other agencies.
4. All other applicants.

IN DESCRIBING YOUR EXPERIENCE, PLEASE BE CLEAR AND SPECIFIC. WE MAY NOT MAKE ASSUMPTIONS REGARDING YOUR EXPERIENCE. Your application, resume, C.V., and/or supporting documentation will be verified. Please follow all instructions carefully. Errors or omissions may affect consideration for employment.

Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional; philanthropic; religions; spiritual; community; student; social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience.

The Department of Veterans Affairs performs pre-employment reference checks as an assessment method used in the hiring process to verify information provided by a candidate (e.g., on resume or during interview or hiring process); gain additional knowledge regarding a candidate's abilities; and assist a hiring manager with making a final selection for a position.

It is the policy of the VA to not deny employment to those that have faced financial hardships or periods of unemployment.

Veterans and Transitioning Service Members: Please visit the VA for Vets site for career-search tools for Veterans seeking employment at VA, career development services for our existing Veterans, and coaching and reintegration support for military service members.

To apply for this position, you must provide a complete Application Package which includes:

• Long-form resume/Curriculum vitae (CV)

The following documents are accepted, and may be required if applicable to your eligibility and/or qualifications for this position. Please ensure you have included all documents required for your application, such as a copy of your transcript (if using education to qualify), SF-50's (current/former Federal employees), etc.

• Cover Letter
• DD-214/ Statement of Service
• Disability Letter (VA)
• Long-form resume/Curriculum vitae (CV)
• Recommended - Knowledge, Skills, and Ability (KSA) documentation - listed under qualifications in the announcement
• Copy of high school diploma OR high school transcript (unofficial or official) OR GED Certificate OR homeschooling completion OR proficiency certificate issued by a State or Territorial Board or Department of Education OR college transcript (official).
• SF-15
• SF-50/ Notification of Personnel Action
• Transcript

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