Who has more stess RT or RN? - Page 2

[quote=R*Star*RN;5878567]Here is how I tell people to decide (sort of funny but true):

If sputum makes you want to vomit, become a nurse.

If urine and feces and blood make you want to vomit, become an RT.

But yes both jobs would b e stressful. As a nurse you have a little more choice in what area you want to work in, while I'd think RT would be limited to the hospital. You could be a clinic nurse, a home health nurse, and office nurse of some sort (ie medical records).[/quote]

I have used that analogy to make my decision to become a nurse as well. However, I have worked in a hospital as a sitter and now as a CA for more than four years. I have seen nurses suction patients too, expecially in the ICU. Also, Ive seen plenty of sputum coming out of trachs. Found myself gagging a couple of times or having to leave the room. It is funny because nothing else like vomit, feces, blood, or seeing a gall bladder being removed in the OR makes me nauseous or give me a feeling I want to jump out of my skin. So nursing here I come! I guess I just can't be an ICU/CCU nurse. I expect to do some suctioning here and there but not on a regular basis.
Some other medical professions claim that nurses do all of the dirty work but I have seen physical therapy, occupational therapy, and radiology clean up paients if they defecate or urinate. They dont wait for the patient to be transported back to the unit for the nurse or tech to clean them up.

Has she considered PT? It comes with it's on set of problems/stress as anything does, but it would give her direct patient care in a hospital or outpatient setting and awesome hours!

I agree with the statements that she needs to make her own decision, but she may also want to understand that RT's go to all the codes and they deal with pts. with a high level of acuity.There are more options with nursing.

I haven't been an RT, but I've worked with many many RT's, especially when I was working LTAC with trachs/vents.

In MY opinion (take it or leave it, just an opinion lol)... At the LTAC level RT's had it MADE. They get to monitor the vents/trachs, get to be in the best position during a code, but had HOURS of sitting and relaxing if they wanted (even napping), while nurses and cna's got the call bells, vent alarms and did trach care other than their scheduled times.

At a hospital, they do seem to work harder, but we don't need them much on my floor, so I can't say.

RN is much more stressful typically. However, if you hate math, RT school will be an absolute suck fest.

Someone else mentioned PT/OT and from what I can tell, at my hospital, they have it made!

They are not present at any of the codes, they simply get the patients up out of bed into a chair or ambulate them in the room or down the hall. If the patient is non-ambulatory, they do exercises with them in bed. There are always 2 (a PT and a PTA), so they don't need help. I get my patients up and to the bathroom/chair/reposition in bed multiple times a day so really, what are they doing differently?
They make recommendations for activity which the doctor approves. The majority of the time, they come looking for the nurse to ask THE NURSE what the patient's level of activity is and they go from there (drives me crazy, but that's a different topic).
Also, they probably make twice as much $ as me and get to call themselves "Dr." They see the patient for 15-20 minutes and if the patient is at a procedure, they leave and come back the next day. Easy, breezy.

But before I offend anyone with these comments, let me say that I am aware that PTs/OTs that work in long term rehab probably do SO MUCH MORE than the ones that work in acute care. I'm only talking about PT/OT in my hospital from what I can see...it looks super easy.

As far as the original question, I think RN is much more stressful than RT. But I'm probably biased TEAM RN!

WanderlustRN24- I worked with so many PT/OT who were awesome, knew their stuff, worked hard, had tons of schooling etc, very great people... but my god, they still had it SO much easier than us and they knew it too! Everything you said- they had their scheduled times with the pt's, saw the new admits charts before ME, had their hour lunch breaks as a group when I didn't get to eat until I got home at the end of the day.

If I could go back in time I'd do OT or PT, minus the schooling, they have it a thousand times better than us.

They're both stressful. When we have a sick baby in front of us, I'm stressed to get an IV started, make sure the temp. is good, check pressures, to get fluids and sugar and meds in the baby, get labs, and make sure the situation flows as smoothly as possible. They are stressed to intubate if needed, get a blood gas, control O2 sats, etc. There are ups and downs during both of our days. She just needs to do what she loves and not worry about the stress.

i agree with noahsmama-- if she has a prob with stress, nothing healthcare related should be in her choices of professions....

Oh and I forgot to mention, if the patient soils themselves when the PT gets them up, PT comes running out of the room to the nurse so that the nurse can clean them up. In the meantime, PT is just hanging out or leaves the floor completely. And they have like 1 one-sided page of charting. Awesome.

But I still love my job.

A significant portion of the population of the United States has stress and depression issues. Many healthcare workers are on medications for these issues. I'm not sure I'd make a sweeping generalisation about career choice.