Eicu

Does any one know the payrates for working as a nurse for EICU? I am considering it, but did not know what it paid. Thanks!

lol...All I could hear in my mind when reading the title was Old McDonald's farm ee-i-ee-i-oooo...lol

Sorry, it has been a long day.

Now, what is an EICU because I am either unfamiliar with those letters or I need sleep.

lol...All I could hear in my mind when reading the title was Old McDonald's farm ee-i-ee-i-oooo...lol

Sorry, it has been a long day.

Now, what is an EICU because I am either unfamiliar with those letters or I need sleep.

Actually, the E-I-E-I-O-ICU is specific to veterinary(sp?) medicine.

The EICU is an 'Electronic ICU' and the nurse working there is basically a tele-tech on steroids. It's a useless concept (in my opinion) that has been piloted by a few places that have lots of money and are willing/able to watse valuable resources on it. People sit off-site and monitor your tele/hemodynamics, etc and lab results and...call you all the time because they try and prove they're useful...oh and have web-cams pointing at you and your patient 24/7.

The only 'use' the thing has is that there is many times a resident or intern or baby-doctor of some sort who is there and can give limited orders in the middle of the night so the 'real' docs dont get woken up...and the shaking scared bedside-nurses dont have to call them

Some people say it is useful to rural or small hospitals because the command monitor-tech central HQ- can link to lots and lots of far-flung places....and can pick your numbers apart and critique your care through video up-links... and who are far better than the 'real' nurses at the bedside...who (because they're in a small or rural hospital...or a hospital who has no faith in bedside nurses...or...)

obviously there're proponents of e-icu that wont agree with me!....it is a WASTE of resources in my opinion.

Has anyone ever considered an 'e-er'...or an 'e-med/surge'...or an 'e-pediatrics'...or...

Sorry...this is a pet-peeve of mine.

Actually, the E-I-E-I-O-ICU is specific to veterinary(sp?) medicine.

The EICU is an 'Electronic ICU' and the nurse working there is basically a tele-tech on steroids. It's a useless concept (in my opinion) that has been piloted by a few places that have lots of money and are willing/able to watse valuable resources on it. People sit off-site and monitor your tele/hemodynamics, etc and lab results and...call you all the time because they try and prove they're useful...oh and have web-cams pointing at you and your patient 24/7.

The only 'use' the thing has is that there is many times a resident or intern or baby-doctor of some sort who is there and can give limited orders in the middle of the night so the 'real' docs dont get woken up...and the shaking scared bedside-nurses dont have to call them

Some people say it is useful to rural or small hospitals because the command monitor-tech central HQ- can link to lots and lots of far-flung places....and can pick your numbers apart and critique your care through video up-links... and who are far better than the 'real' nurses at the bedside...who (because they're in a small or rural hospital...or a hospital who has no faith in bedside nurses...or...)

obviously there're proponents of e-icu that wont agree with me!....it is a WASTE of resources in my opinion.

Has anyone ever considered an 'e-er'...or an 'e-med/surge'...or an 'e-pediatrics'...or...

Sorry...this is a pet-peeve of mine.

ohhh yeah. I have heard of those. I think the initial thought of the doc being able to look into the room and view that pt from afar was a nice idea, but it has a big brother feel to it. And, a bit creepy, I might add. What if I am bathing the pt or doing something that they might not want viewed on you tube?

I have no idea what the pay rates are, but would like to throw out my two cents about the value of the eicu. I work in a large teaching hospital on a 22 bed neuro surgical trauma icu and we LOVE the EICU!! First of all the camera is not on 24/7, they rank the patients in order of how seriously ill they are and that will reflect on how often they camera in on the patient. Also why would it ever be considered a bad thing to have another nurse and intensivist looking in on a patient. Me personally, if it were my family member I would appreciate the extra eyes. Also we love the fact that when we need someone quick, like in 30 seconds we can count on them to help us out. Once I got an admit who was an upper and lower gi bleeder, homeless guy who was going through some major ETOH withdrawal and the camera zoomed in as we were struggling with this guy who was about to extubate himself even though there were two of us holding him down and he was restrained. The Intensivist called the unit and ordered some sedation/antianxiety meds and told the nurse on the phone to quickly draw it up and bring it to me, then he miked into the room to let me know what he had ordered and that it was on the way.

I could give you so many more stories of how they have assissted in code situations and of how thankful the night nurses are to have them there because there are tons of examples. This has increased nursing satisfaction at our hospital and the families of our patients have seen it as an incredible resource rather than a waste of resources. As far as costs go, the cost was higher when we were one of the only hospitals footing the bill, but now other hospitals have joined in to share both the benefit of EICU and the cost of it with our hospital. I thank the EICU!

I have no idea what the pay rates are, but would like to throw out my two cents about the value of the eicu. I work in a large teaching hospital on a 22 bed neuro surgical trauma icu and we LOVE the EICU!! First of all the camera is not on 24/7, they rank the patients in order of how seriously ill they are and that will reflect on how often they camera in on the patient. Also why would it ever be considered a bad thing to have another nurse and intensivist looking in on a patient. Me personally, if it were my family member I would appreciate the extra eyes. Also we love the fact that when we need someone quick, like in 30 seconds we can count on them to help us out. Once I got an admit who was an upper and lower gi bleeder, homeless guy who was going through some major ETOH withdrawal and the camera zoomed in as we were struggling with this guy who was about to extubate himself even though there were two of us holding him down and he was restrained. The Intensivist called the unit and ordered some sedation/antianxiety meds and told the nurse on the phone to quickly draw it up and bring it to me, then he miked into the room to let me know what he had ordered and that it was on the way.

I could give you so many more stories of how they have assissted in code situations and of how thankful the night nurses are to have them there because there are tons of examples. This has increased nursing satisfaction at our hospital and the families of our patients have seen it as an incredible resource rather than a waste of resources. As far as costs go, the cost was higher when we were one of the only hospitals footing the bill, but now other hospitals have joined in to share both the benefit of EICU and the cost of it with our hospital. I thank the EICU!

wow...I did not know it worked that way. but I guess I am wondering if there are docs that just sit and look at cameras all day.

I work as a unit secretary in an EICU and I know that the nurses make around $60 an hour. Then too they have to have at least 5 years of experience in critical care nursing.

Actually, the E-I-E-I-O-ICU is specific to veterinary(sp?) medicine.

The EICU is an 'Electronic ICU' and the nurse working there is basically a tele-tech on steroids. It's a useless concept (in my opinion) that has been piloted by a few places that have lots of money and are willing/able to watse valuable resources on it. People sit off-site and monitor your tele/hemodynamics, etc and lab results and...call you all the time because they try and prove they're useful...oh and have web-cams pointing at you and your patient 24/7.

The only 'use' the thing has is that there is many times a resident or intern or baby-doctor of some sort who is there and can give limited orders in the middle of the night so the 'real' docs dont get woken up...and the shaking scared bedside-nurses dont have to call them

Some people say it is useful to rural or small hospitals because the command monitor-tech central HQ- can link to lots and lots of far-flung places....and can pick your numbers apart and critique your care through video up-links... and who are far better than the 'real' nurses at the bedside...who (because they're in a small or rural hospital...or a hospital who has no faith in bedside nurses...or...)

obviously there're proponents of e-icu that wont agree with me!....it is a WASTE of resources in my opinion.

Has anyone ever considered an 'e-er'...or an 'e-med/surge'...or an 'e-pediatrics'...or...

Sorry...this is a pet-peeve of mine.

I agree that its a waste. It ****** of most staff members that have to deal with them. I would personally not want to work somewhere that I had to stop and go have some telemetry tech, as you mentioned, tell me that my patient just had a pvc or needs to be turned. No thanks.

That is not even how they work. They monitor way too many patients to call about petty PVC's or stuff like that. I had one in Miami and I loved it. They only look into the rooms once a shift, so they are not calling you about turning your patients or spying on you. You can hear when the camera comes on in the room anyway if you are in there. Like it or not, this is the wave of the future since intensivists are in short supply, which is why eicus were developed in the 1st place. More of them keep popping up every year and the AACN already has a special CCRN just for EICU RN's, so you might as well get ready for it. Nurses do not like change, but this is not going away. Lots of medical and nursing organizations have done research on the effectiveness of Eicus and they all have done well, so they are not going stop developing more because people who have never even worked with one do not like the idea. If they can prove that patients in a hospital with one have recieved better care with less infection or complications, then it will stay. Being unhappy about it doesn't help, and if the nurses who think that they are perfect in their practice do not need them, then that is ok too because they should never have to call you about anything anyway.

That is not even how they work. They monitor way too many patients to call about petty PVC's or stuff like that. I had one in Miami and I loved it. They only look into the rooms once a shift, so they are not calling you about turning your patients or spying on you. You can hear when the camera comes on in the room anyway if you are in there. Like it or not, this is the wave of the future since intensivists are in short supply, which is why eicus were developed in the 1st place. More of them keep popping up every year and the AACN already has a special CCRN just for EICU RN's, so you might as well get ready for it. Nurses do not like change, but this is not going away. Lots of medical and nursing organizations have done research on the effectiveness of Eicus and they all have done well, so they are not going stop developing more because people who have never even worked with one do not like the idea. If they can prove that patients in a hospital with one have recieved better care with less infection or complications, then it will stay. Being unhappy about it doesn't help, and if the nurses who think that they are perfect in their practice do not need them, then that is ok too because they should never have to call you about anything anyway.

That might the case in Miami, however it is not the case in a lot of places. I have worked for several hospitals and an agency and one hospital I worked for specificially hates it BECAUSE they are calling all the time for insane stuff and are considering getting rid of it.

That might the case in Miami, however it is not the case in a lot of places. I have worked for several hospitals and an agency and one hospital I worked for specificially hates it BECAUSE they are calling all the time for insane stuff and are considering getting rid of it.

Maybe the one you worked at didn't quite have their system together yet. Don't base your opinion on the way 1 or 2 eICU's operate. The one I work at is awesome. Nurses do not ring into the room or call the unit to tell the floor nurse that the patient needs to be turned. That's ridiculous. I work the graveyard shift and we get calls ALL NIGHT from units asking for orders from our doc and asking for other types of advice. We cover 18 units at 10 different hospitals. Studies have been done for our area's eicu and the occurance of death caused by sepsis related issues has definitely decreased. SO my opinion is that eICU is very helpful. Maybe it's because we have a nurse manager who does whatever she can to keep us going on a positive trend. I'm supporting this unit not because I work in it but because it is quite successful and very supportive. I'm not even a nurse yet but I plan on working there once I get my CCRN and my 5 years of critical care experience.

At the hospital I worked at in Michigan the EICU RN's although they are referred to as VICU (virtual intensive care unit) are on the same pay scale as staff nurses which is base pay $24.70 and top of scale $32.66.