Who has more stess RT or RN?

Nurses Stress 101

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My SIL whom is very smart is trying to decide between these two programs. She doesn't do well with long periods of high stress(she gets anxious and depressed). I told her to try Respiratory Therapy as hospital nursing is very stressful A LOT of the time. The RT instructor told her RT is more stressful than nursing because of the critical care needs of many of the patients they deal with. She has shadowed both a rn and rt but is still deciding, she has until next friday to make her choice.

For those of you that work in a hospital, which would you choose to recommend to a family member if you had to pick one of the two based on stress levels.? She is dead set on working in the hospital in a patient care position...I originally suggested medical administration or medical coding but she wants to see patients.

Specializes in Oncology; medical specialty website.
Neither. Both are stressful.

FYI, RTs are not the only ones working in highly stressful, critical care environments. Nurses are there 24/7 and a lot of non-respiratory crap hits the fan too. RTs arent there for those stressful moments, but the nurses are.

Le's not turn this into a "who has it harder" thread. We need RNs and RTs, and everywhere I've worked, RTs were there 24/7 too.

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Specializes in ER.

Nursing is stressful, but if the poop hits the fan, do you want to be the one that watches while someone else solves the problem, or do you want to be the one who can actually do something about it?

Good nurses can prevent more problems in one hour than any other discipline can fix in a whole day. We make a big difference!

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Specializes in Oncology; medical specialty website.
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!

They get to call themselves "doctor," because they've earned the right to do so, if they have a doctoral degree.

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Specializes in ICU.

RT can be equally as stressfull. although they only deal with one body system primarily, when things go bad they go bad. Im the rapid response nurse, and when there a call its me and the RT, you can bet I thank my lucky stars they are there with a major respiratory issue or airway issue. Sure makes me a little less anxious being in that room. Managing airways and breathing situations in emergency situations is very stressfull. Theres a lot of times where they do give neb treatments for basic stuff, but they have a broad range of places to work ICU, pediatrics, NICU where they deal with the occilator vents, med surg ect , they can work in pulmonary function labs as well. Both are stressfull, just depends on which area you work. With nursing theres a lot of places to work out of hosiptal so the stress level may not be as bad.

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Specializes in ICU.

Okay, so you're working on your ICU patient and the ventilator goes BOING! Quick! What do you do??? - Bag the patient.

Okay, so now you're working on your ICU patient and his total artificial heart goes BOING! Quick! What do you do??? (besides FREAK OUT)

WHo's got more riding on the line? :)

I couldn't name one RT that would have traded jobs with me, pay and all.

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It's a bit more complicated than simply bagging however. Say you have a PEEP dependent patient or a patient on HFOV. Will they tolerate being bagged for any amount of time?

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Different stresses... personally, I do better knowing a few things really well than a little about a lot, so between the two in an acute care setting on the general floors, I'd think RT would suit me better. Of course, nurses work in many different settings with different responsibilities so one can't generalize about *all* RN positions. Still, *many* RN positions do cover a wide bredth of areas - all physiologic systems, family & psych issues, coordinating with different departments (pharmacy, diagnostics)... and more! To me, it's stressful not being able to really dig into anything and constantly hop from putting out one fire to another.

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Specializes in ICU.

Even if they were peep dependent, you still can bag them for a while.

If your artificial heart goes down, you can't do CPR! :eek:

Just say'n.

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And HFOV? What about RT's who are on ECMO teams or a fire under 3 ATM's of pressure during a "dive?" While I agree RT is generally not as stressful, it's not nearly as simple as "bag em."

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Specializes in ICU, ER.
Le's not turn this into a "who has it harder" thread. We need RNs and RTs, and everywhere I've worked, RTs were there 24/7 too.

I believe I clearly stated both professions are stressful. I have never worked in a facility where all patients are assigned to a RT 24/7, but each pt is assigned to a nurse at all times.

My comment has absolutely nothing to do with who has it harder. I've never been a RT so I can only comment on what I have seen in my own career.

Like I said, both RNs and RTs work in highly stressful critical care environments, but the RTs are not there when pt is crashing unless we are actively coding, intubating, or pt is crashing r/t respiratory issue. And at my hospital (which is not small) our RTs are only there until a certain time so who do you think is doing the work the RTs would be doing if they were there? Yep, the RNs on top of everything else we were already assigned to.

Also I never, ever said we don't need RTs so I sure hope your last line wasn't directed at me as well... Everyone has their place on the multidisciplinary team.

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