egood

Yes it's true, NIPPLeizer. The patient said "Honey, I need my NIPPLEizer, I'm SOB."

Or the family members who want snacks and drinks for all ten of them- go to the vending machines, this isn't the free food bank!!!

How about CPAK for CPAP, albutroll for albuterol, atovent for atrovent, nippleizer for nebulizer, track for trach, ammonia for pneumonia!!! Off subject- NO I can't draw an ABG from a picc line!!!!

Also, the hospital I work for provides fulltimers 3 pants, 3 tops, and a long sleeve scrub jacket.

We have color coded scrub dresscodes but can wear any color scrubs on Friday! Yipee!!! I usually wear bright colors in the summer and spring, b/c usually I'm in navy. The patients usually say they:p like the bright colorful scrubs.

Yes, these are the "nursing" duties I have helped with, I hate it when a pt. says they have been lying in their stool for hours. I have also learned in school and am qualified to do some other "nursing" duties---vitals,draw blood, start iv's,art lines, swans, If it was under "my scope of practice", I coluld also put a med in a pt's mouth and give them a drink of h20 to wash it down. I could go on and on about the things(nursing duties I am capable of doing), but I don't want to waste my time on someone who seems to have so much dislike and disrespect for RRT's and other members of the healthcare team. No wonder you don't get along with the RRT's. oh, by the way, I am very well respected, liked and wanted at the hospitals where I work, especially by nurses.

Just like with anything else - there are good ones and bad ones. A great, team-minded RT can be your best friend, and a bad one can ruin your whole night. Where I work, we have examples of both kind. The bad ones are the kind someone mentioned earlier in the thread who don't seem to realize that there is more to a patient than the resp system. I think a team approach is critical, and people need to know their limits of expertise - and try to stay off the other team member's toes. The above post goes for nurses as well. There are good and bad nurses, who have the potential to ruin an RT's night. I can't tell you how many times a nurse has called RT to give a pt. a breathing treatment to a pt who is in CHF and full of crackles--albuterol is not indicated to treat chf and crackles. Hey, how about some lasix and Rt will set them up on Bipap!!!! In a few hours they should be much better. Or a nurse calls about a pt on RA whose sats are 82-84%, bs clear, and the nurse wants a stat hhn tx. Hey how about some c/db or some 02! HHN with albuterol tx wheezing, and decreased bs, not crackles(lasix), ronchi(cough/sx). These are just a few of my favorite things!!!!:roll :angryfire

Thank you airis, you said it so much better than I did. I was just fuming after reading some of the posts bashing and disrespecting RRT's. I love my job and am confident in my skills and knowledge as an RRT.

To canoehead, I'm an RT and an RN can give a neb too, but an RT can also do a lot of the duties nurses do too. It may not be under our scope of practice, but we are educated and have more skills and knowledge that a lot of nurses think we have. I've been in many situations where the I have known what to do and the nurse didn't, and it wasn't only respiratory related. I am going back to school for nursing and I know that with my RT backround and experience, I will be an excellent RRT/RN. I will make it my mission to respect ALL healthcare workers, we are all in this together as a TEAM. I am one of those Rt's who will put a pt on/off bed pad, feed them, get them water ect...I will do anything I can for the Pt's. it's all about Pt care. I think Pt's recieve better care with the different Therapys, If one person tried to do it all the pt's would suffer.

Oh, one other thing, the ER is for EMERGENCYS!!!!!!!! I don't understand why that is so hard for people to understand. A person with lets say a stuffy nose :angryfire is not an EMERGENCY. Patients who are in an emergency are not being treated in a timely manner and are suffering because people(not only homeless) are coming to the ER for non-emergent situations. It's so unfair and frustrating.

Lori Alabama RN-----I totally agree with you! I believe that people may need public assistance at some point in their lives, but it should be limited. Too many people abuse the system . My mother was a single mom, she worked her orifice off to provide for us. she has no college degree, but she did what she needed to do for us. She eventually remarried, but ended up divorced, pregnant (2nd child), and lost her job (lay offs). At the time of her divorce and job loss she was 6 months pregnant. She went on unemployment and eventually welfare. This lasted a total of about 5 months. she found a job when my my brother was about 2mos. old and she went off welfare and went back to work------hence -public assistance for a limited time when in need. She has since had a job and continued to sacrafice and work her orifice off to give my brother and I a life. I respect her and am so proud she in my mother. She instilled in us life is not easy, it takes sacrafices and hard work. I am so glad she did not abuse the system, because I believe it becomes a way of life for a lot of the people on PA, and it goes on from generation to generation. The people who ABUSE the system sicken me, while people like my mother worked and sacrafice their whole life and their hard earned money goes to the abusers. Again- I believe people may need limited assistance at some point in their lives- and thats ok- but eventually they need to be responsible productive people.