If you like math, science and solving mysteries, the perfect job may be waiting for you in a laboratory at one of the local hospitals. Kathy Errter is the director of the medical lab technology programs at lakeland community college, one of a handful of programs that train students for jobs as medical laboratory technicians or medical technologists - and Errter says there are plenty of them.
ERRTER: Hospitals are always calling me to see if I have any students -- and my students already have jobs
The reason for the shortage is that as many as 40% of current laboratory personal are reaching retirement. Errter says medical technology is not a field that's well publicized, and recruiting replacements for these steady, well-paid jobs with benefits is, at best, low key.
ERRTER: It's definitely behind the scenes. Everybody knows what a nurse does, everybody knows what a doctor does. Nobody knows what a medical technologist does.
What they do is perform the routine blood tests that doctors and nurses order in hospitals every day, 24-7. And that, Errter says, translates into lots of jobs in a hospital-dense community like Cleveland.
Gretchen Cuda, 90.3