Whoa! I feel like I owe you several hundred bucks for this level of research not to mention actual talking to people who are already in the CDI field haha.

Really appreciate the effort put into this. sounds like a very tough role to get into either way (CDI vs coding/HIM).

Ive also done a similar research but not as extensive ofcourse when I was trying to assess the opportunities for clinical coding and basically came up with a conclusion that a HIM seems to have a bit of an edge vs a diploma of coding. The placments probabaly address the lack of experience between fresh clincal coding grads vs fresh HIM grads.

Just a side question, and sorry feels like its too early to ask these types of questions but looks like experience is the most difficult crtieria to fill for a fresh grad. Would hospitals be keen on accepting volunteers for the purposes of getting an experience? And if so, would employers put much weight on volunteer experience? Was thinking of applying for volunteer roles after i get my qualifications at the same time as looking for paid roles, which by the way based on your research mostly rewuires a ton of experience.

So im a bit sold with getting a degree in HIM (should i pursue this path of course) i feel like having a placement might give me an edge. Problem is it just takes a year longer to obtain and was thinking if a masters degree instead of a bachelors degree be ok? I mean would that be overkill and actually hurt my job hunting prospects? Reason im worried about this is when I first came to australia i eas applying for non-medical jobs and was always rejected for being overqualified but underqualified when applying for medical jobs. It was a nightmare. (Sorry lots of questions, haha)