Explore jobs
Find specific jobs
Explore careers
Explore professions
Best companies
Explore companies
The differences between hearing instrument specialists and certified medical technicians can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. While it typically takes 1-2 years to become a hearing instrument specialist, becoming a certified medical technician takes usually requires 6-12 months. Additionally, a hearing instrument specialist has an average salary of $50,442, which is higher than the $38,859 average annual salary of a certified medical technician.
The top three skills for a hearing instrument specialist include patients, patient care and customer service. The most important skills for a certified medical technician are patients, vital signs, and CPR.
| Hearing Instrument Specialist | Certified Medical Technician | |
| Yearly salary | $50,442 | $38,859 |
| Hourly rate | $24.25 | $18.68 |
| Growth rate | - | 5% |
| Number of jobs | 3,529 | 164,424 |
| Job satisfaction | - | - |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 61% | Bachelor's Degree, 28% |
| Average age | 43 | 44 |
| Years of experience | 2 | 12 |
A hearing instrument specialist specializes in assessing people who have hearing problems. They must match these persons with the best assistive hearing device available. They are responsible for attending to people who have hearing problems and carrying out hearing tests such as pure tone screening or immittance screening. They also also select, dispense, and fit hearing aids.
Certified Medical Technicians are specialists in medical diagnoses by performing laboratory testing and analysis for hospitals and physicians. Their duties include lab sanitization to prepare for testing and collection, recording medical samples for testing, specimen preparation, blood drawing for donation and testing, and assisting physicians with sample collection as well as equipment handling in surgical rooms. They must also understand how to use complex and sensitive testing equipment such as cell counters, analyzers, microscopes, and centrifuges.
Hearing instrument specialists and certified medical technicians have different pay scales, as shown below.
| Hearing Instrument Specialist | Certified Medical Technician | |
| Average salary | $50,442 | $38,859 |
| Salary range | Between $28,000 And $90,000 | Between $28,000 And $53,000 |
| Highest paying City | - | Denton, TX |
| Highest paying state | - | Alaska |
| Best paying company | - | Favorite Healthcare Staffing |
| Best paying industry | - | Health Care |
There are a few differences between a hearing instrument specialist and a certified medical technician in terms of educational background:
| Hearing Instrument Specialist | Certified Medical Technician | |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 61% | Bachelor's Degree, 28% |
| Most common major | Business | Nursing |
| Most common college | Northwestern University | University of Connecticut |
Here are the differences between hearing instrument specialists' and certified medical technicians' demographics:
| Hearing Instrument Specialist | Certified Medical Technician | |
| Average age | 43 | 44 |
| Gender ratio | Male, 58.5% Female, 41.5% | Male, 20.4% Female, 79.6% |
| Race ratio | Black or African American, 8.1% Unknown, 5.1% Hispanic or Latino, 15.0% Asian, 7.6% White, 63.6% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.6% | Black or African American, 15.9% Unknown, 5.0% Hispanic or Latino, 14.6% Asian, 10.0% White, 53.8% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.8% |
| LGBT Percentage | 8% | 8% |