How do hosp staff treat resp therapists?

New CCU RN · Dec 15, 2002

All the resp therapists I have worked with have been wonderful, very knowledgable and very overworked. Every hospital is a little different on how much the therapist does. I am in CICU at a large teaching institution and our therapists and nurses together make vent changes and then update the MD;s in most situations. Other hospitals they much more limited.

I do know that from conversations with our RT's they feel very stressed over the large amount of patients they are expected to cover for. That is the one negative thing they have said about being an RT.

I could be wrong, but from my understanding generally an RT makes slightly less than an RN. I know a few RNs who are former RT;s who made the switch for money and the ability to have more patient contact.

I think RT's are treated fairly well in the hosp setting, at least from my own observations. Our MD's value their input greatly and rely on their judgement/assessment of the situation. And I know I am certainly grateful when they come when a pt is going bad!!!!

Sleepyeyes · Dec 15, 2002

...and when they're Right There when you have a Code for bagging and ABG's....

Always Glad to see the RT's here

SmilingBluEyes · Dec 15, 2002

Like Gold. seriously. I think they are wonderful..just like us nurses.

ZORYA · Dec 15, 2002

Thx for the input..Still haven't made up my mind yet, but I sure am grateful for the opinions.... :kiss

RN2B2005 · Dec 16, 2002

Husband's best friend is an RT at a major hospital in Seattle. He likes his job, but gets very stressed on a fairly regular basis. I think it has to do with understaffing and mandatory overtime.

Tweety, BSN, RN · Dec 16, 2002

We generally have a great relationship with our resp. therapy department. There are a couple of problem personalities. Generally, we have the utmost respect for our RT's. When we need them, they are there.

They are short staffed and overworked at our hospital at times as well.

mattsmom81 · Dec 16, 2002

One thing in favor of becoming a RT...they don't seem to suffer from the effects of burnout as much as nurses do, as they aren't held accountable for as much as nurses are. They can limit their responsibility to respiratory matters, whereas nurses seem to be held responsible for everything...and all depts... : (

.... and RT's only have to deal with sputum where nurses have ALL the body secretions to clean up...LOL! A definite plus in my book...LOL!

In retrospect I would have held up better as a RT I think. I hear now they are forced to do MOT much like nurses tho...

deespoohbear · Dec 16, 2002

Originally posted by 3rdShiftGuy
We generally have a great relationship with our resp. therapy department. There are a couple of problem personalities. Generally, we have the utmost respect for our RT's. When we need them, they are there.

They are short staffed and overworked at our hospital at times as well.

Same for our facility.....we do have one weekend RT who thinks she runs the show...she actually told one of our nurses on the weekend that she should have checked with RT before calling the doctor about this pt's downgoing resp status. I usually do check with RT about their recommendations for a pt, but sometimes they are not immediately available and the situation can't wait....But all in all, I think our RT's are great....

Mattigan, RN · Dec 16, 2002

The Registered guys or the the other ones that worked at Burger King last week and had OJT and tell me what I need to do?????

Agnus · Dec 16, 2002

Originally posted by Mattigan
The Registered guys or the the other ones that worked at Burger King last week and had OJT and tell me what I need to do?????

What are you trying to say here??

Your post is unclear to me.

I work with RTs and vent patients every day. I do confer consult and discuss patient problems with them. There are time I have the good sense to defer to thier judgement. I will sometimes ASK them about a best course of action. This is thier speciality. It is no more degrading to do this with an RT than to keep a patient NPO when a speech therapist says a patient has a swallow problem based on HER eval.

Yes I am the nurse and ultimately in charge of pt. care but there is a reason we have these specilized therapist. It is because a nurse cannot be all things to all people with the depth of knowledge and experience of all these specilized therapist.

We work together combining all our expertise to give the patient better care than would otherwise be possible.

If I misunderstood your post then I apologize now.

Yes I am capable of acting as an RT and have done it. I was trained to do swallow evals but the speech therapist has much more indepth training and skill and experience at this.

Consentrated specialized training and education is a lot different than the general education we have. Even when nurses specialze we are generalist in that speciality because of the broad area we must cover unlike therapists.

I hope I misunderstood you.

2banurse · Dec 16, 2002

Originally posted by ZORYA
I am currently trying to mk a decision between resp therapy or nursing...What are your opinions on the difference? Also; how are resp therapists treated in the hospital setting?
Thanks in advance for all advice, opinions and comments....

Zorya, I had actually looked into this as well. Unfortunately:o the program at my community college folded because there were not enough applicants.

Best of luck in your decision!

Kris