Ag15

Speaking of that....they actually did have a fire there about 6 months ago! I feel so bad for the staff here, the doctors are so terrible to them and have been allowed to act this way. Thank you for listening and your advice!

They do not wait for Chloraprep to dry!

I agree that the time outs have gotten out of control on too much info....like you said, by the time they get done with it I don't even remember what we are doing lol. At this hospital here is how the time outs are done..."time out this is John Doe 4/5/1900 we are doing a knee replacement on right side". Their "site marking" is an arrow (no initals). This is not okay to me!

Ned, thank you for the information! The place I'm at seems completely shut off from the real world. The nurses/OR staff were unaware of what is included in a "time out". What do you say in your time out process? I look like the bad guy here when I'm insisting on basic safety measures be taken.

Saline in a plastic surgery center using tumescent....company tried to creat a "new" mixture using water instead. Still don't know how there can be a national shortage of saline!

Thank you for the reply! I will definitely post on that site too. In my searches before, this site came up a lot so I decided to join. It's always nice to get a nurses point of view on things along with techs :)

My first travel assignment was at a Hopkins hospital in DC, they love travelers there and have a lot of them. I'm from the midwest and was a little nervous about going to the east coast but the people at the hospital were some of the nicest people I've ever met!

Hello I am traveling on my third assignment as a Surgical Tech and had some questions regarding scopes of practice in different states, any advice/info is much appreciated! I'm from Kansas City and that's where I went to school and worked at a few area hospitals and was a private scrub for a group of surgeons. Around there, the techs are expected to assist (with some limitations) unless it is a complex case that requires a second surgeon. I've been to DC where the techs don't assist....they barely are allowed to even hold a retractor or do normal assisting duties (or what I thought was normal). Docs have a PA on every case or student/resident. I've also been to Kentucky where they use the techs as assistants on every case. When I say assist I mean they literally do the surgery lol. Inject local, make incisions, put in trocars, fire staplers, etc. They also make two techs and one nurse be on call at the same time, one tech to assist and the other to do the passing. The techs here also do most of the circulating duties. My question is, why is it so different everywhere? How can I find out what the scope of practice is in different states? There seems to be a lot of grey area. Again, thanks for any suggestions!