CVU- is this considered critical care?

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Hey All!

So I interviewed for a position at a nearby hospital for multiple units. They returned a call to me offering me a position in a CVU. Would you consider this critical care experience?? Or would that only include CVICU.

I am open to new things but am mostly looking for critical care experience to add to my resume.

Thanks ahead of time for your insight!

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Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.

Different hospitals call their units different things. I'm not sure what "CVU" means to the hospital that offered you the position. Since you interviewed for the position, you've probably had a chance to tour the unit and talk to the manager. What kind of an impression did you get?

In general, "CVICU" sounds like critical care, and "CVU" might be their step down.

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Specializes in Medical-Surgical/Float Pool/Stepdown.

We have an area called CDU or clinical decision unit, farthest you can get from a critical care unit as these are suppose to be pts that just need no more than 24 hours of observation but don't meet the criteria to be inpatient. It would really help us all out if you knew what the acronym really means spelled out.

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Call the general hospital number and ask who ever answers what it stands for.

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Specializes in Critical Care.

"CVU" usually stands for Cardiovascular Unit. These are usually considered progressive care or stepdown, whether that's considered within the realm of "critical care" depends on who you ask. If it's mainly CP rule outs, post-caths, stable heart failure exacerbations, etc then that isn't usually considered critical care experience. If it includes patients with invasive monitoring (CVP, PA and Art lines), titrated vasopressors/inotropes/etc then it should be considered a form of critical care experience.

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In my hospital it's not. It's called the cardiovascular unit and is sort of a step down unit. They deal with just cardio things so I would call it more of a specialized unit than a medsurg unit.

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Specializes in ICU.

It really depends on the hospital. One place I worked at called their open heart ICU the ACU - acute coronary unit. You're going to have to ask.

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Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
Call the general hospital number and ask who ever answers what it stands for.

This is a great idea!

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