My job required I be cross trained to work in both the pre operative area (department 3C) and the post operative area (the PACU). In 3C, I would normally work the 5:30 am shift since I could get a whole shift in before I had classes in the afternoon. In my opinion, it was one of the best shifts to work since so much was happening and I kept busy so the time passed fast. In the beginning of my shift, I was responsible for acquiring a patients chart, retrieving them from the waiting lounge, then settling them into a room. It was also my job to take their first set of vitals, enter them into our online charting system, and get them prepped for their pre operative nurse who would be in after I completed my duties. Prepping could include anything from showing them the bathroom, to explaining the general outline of their day, to even helping them change into their surgical gown and get settled into their bed.
This pattern continued until all the available rooms were filled. It then became a waiting game for operating rooms to finish setting up and for patients to be moved into them. After patients started to leave for the OR, my job was to wipe down the rooms, make sure to restock any supplies that were used, and transport the patients belongings to a secure area to be held until they needed them again. After these steps were completed, I would again room patients and prepare for the second wave that would move into the OR's in a few hours. In between all this, I might assist a nurse by grabbing needed supplies, clean and make beds, or just be available to the nurse manager for any other tasks. If patients had a same day surgery scheduled, after leaving the the PACU, they would come back to 3C (which was called phase II of recovery) where they would eat something, meet family, and start to be discharged by a nurse. Working with patients who were going through phase II meant retrieving family from the lounge to sit with them, bringing patients crackers or juice, assisting them to the bathroom (which was one of the criteria for them to leave), cleaning the room after they left, and maybe even bringing them down to the entrance in a wheel chair and assisting them into their cars so they could go home. The routine in 3C is pretty set and it doesn't deviate much from day to day, unlike PACU.
While 3C was nice since you would always know what to expect next, PACU was fun too since this is where a lot of the hands on, critical care learning occurs. In PACU, my main job was to meet gurneys as they came out of the OR's. As an OR team came into the room, they would be directed to a numbered bay where a post op nurse would be waiting to meet them. My job was to get the patient hooked into our monitors so vital signs could start being collected. The first to always be hooked up were the ECG lines, the blood pressure cuff, and the pulse oximeter. After that, I would plug in any other needed devices (a device that blew hot air directly into the surgical gown to keep patients warm and leg compression devices to prevent blood clots), took a temperature, and reported to the nurse to see if they needed help with anything else right away. Other than that, I grabbed supplies for the nurses when they were needed, cleaned and stocked bays, and performed transports to the upper levels of the hospital as well as back to 3C for phase II patients. Both 3C and PACU had aspects that made working either exciting, but my favorite would have to be 3C since I was able to sit and talk with patients about their lives and hear about what circumstances brought them to our surgical department.
This pattern continued until all the available rooms were filled. It then became a waiting game for operating rooms to finish setting up and for patients to be moved into them. After patients started to leave for the OR, my job was to wipe down the rooms, make sure to restock any supplies that were used, and transport the patients belongings to a secure area to be held until they needed them again. After these steps were completed, I would again room patients and prepare for the second wave that would move into the OR's in a few hours. In between all this, I might assist a nurse by grabbing needed supplies, clean and make beds, or just be available to the nurse manager for any other tasks. If patients had a same day surgery scheduled, after leaving the the PACU, they would come back to 3C (which was called phase II of recovery) where they would eat something, meet family, and start to be discharged by a nurse. Working with patients who were going through phase II meant retrieving family from the lounge to sit with them, bringing patients crackers or juice, assisting them to the bathroom (which was one of the criteria for them to leave), cleaning the room after they left, and maybe even bringing them down to the entrance in a wheel chair and assisting them into their cars so they could go home. The routine in 3C is pretty set and it doesn't deviate much from day to day, unlike PACU.
While 3C was nice since you would always know what to expect next, PACU was fun too since this is where a lot of the hands on, critical care learning occurs. In PACU, my main job was to meet gurneys as they came out of the OR's. As an OR team came into the room, they would be directed to a numbered bay where a post op nurse would be waiting to meet them. My job was to get the patient hooked into our monitors so vital signs could start being collected. The first to always be hooked up were the ECG lines, the blood pressure cuff, and the pulse oximeter. After that, I would plug in any other needed devices (a device that blew hot air directly into the surgical gown to keep patients warm and leg compression devices to prevent blood clots), took a temperature, and reported to the nurse to see if they needed help with anything else right away. Other than that, I grabbed supplies for the nurses when they were needed, cleaned and stocked bays, and performed transports to the upper levels of the hospital as well as back to 3C for phase II patients. Both 3C and PACU had aspects that made working either exciting, but my favorite would have to be 3C since I was able to sit and talk with patients about their lives and hear about what circumstances brought them to our surgical department.
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