RAAPID

flyingchange · May 23, 2013

Not sure what it's like to work for them, but I definitely know what it's like to call them... dare I say RAAPID is the bane of our existence in Emerg? It all depends on the individual nurse you speak to.

lilaclover6984 · May 23, 2013

Not sure what it's like to work for them but I definitely know what it's like to call them... dare I say RAAPID is the bane of our existence in Emerg? It all depends on the individual nurse you speak to.[/quote']
Care to elaborate a little for me?
Does it seem like it would be a stressful job?

flyingchange · May 23, 2013

They find beds and consults for patients who need to be moved from one place to another. All requests for beds and consults must go through RAAPID. The nurse on the phone ultimately decides what happens with the patient, and some nurses get pretty uppity about that. They have argued with the unit clerks about what the MD's plan is (many times). They have demanded to know all kinds of irrelevant information like whether the pt came in by EMS or what their discharge plans are, even though they are an unstable NSTEMI.

I get the point for RAAPID but nearly every charge nurse and unit clerk on my unit has been verbally abused by them before. As they say, **** flows downhill, so one wonders what their supervisors are telling them.

Not sure what it would be like to work there. I've worked in call centers before and "never again" not even as a nurse.

lilaclover6984 · May 23, 2013

They find beds and consults for patients who need to be moved from one place to another. All requests for beds and consults must go through RAAPID. The nurse on the phone ultimately decides what happens with the patient, and some nurses get pretty uppity about that. They have argued with the unit clerks about what the MD's plan is (many times). They have demanded to know all kinds of irrelevant information like whether the pt came in by EMS or what their discharge plans are, even though they are an unstable NSTEMI.
I get the point for RAAPID but nearly every charge nurse and unit clerk on my unit has been verbally abused by them before. As they say, **** flows downhill, so one wonders what their supervisors are telling them.
Not sure what it would be like to work there. I've worked in call centers before and "never again" not even as a nurse.

Thank you so much for the info. That's pretty much what my understanding of the job was.

I have also worked in call centres prior to becoming a nurse and I actually kinda liked it.

Fiona59 · May 23, 2013

I interviewed for them when they first started up and know a couple of people who have worked there.

The RNs were shall we say different. The LPNs that I know who took the job, all felt that it was too much on a full time line. They didn't mind working part time there.

Back when I interviewed, they were just setting up they didn't know if they were doing 8 or 12 hours. They didn't know if they were hiring part time and casual eventually. They really didn't know what LPNs did on the floor but wanted experienced LPNs because "you know what care people in beds need" but they made it clear that they felt it should be an RN doing the job.

Edmonton's RAAPID is located downtown and there was no staff parking available (only for the big guys, not the worker drones).

We just tend to get really snarly faxes from them with absolutely no knowledge of why the patients are coming into an outpatient clinic, other than basically saying "drop everything you are doing and fit this out of towner in"

lilaclover6984 · May 23, 2013

I interviewed for them when they first started up and know a couple of people who have worked there.
The RNs were shall we say different. The LPNs that I know who took the job, all felt that it was too much on a full time line. They didn't mind working part time there.
Back when I interviewed, they were just setting up they didn't know if they were doing 8 or 12 hours. They didn't know if they were hiring part time and casual eventually. They really didn't know what LPNs did on the floor but wanted experienced LPNs because "you know what care people in beds need" but they made it clear that they felt it should be an RN doing the job.
Edmonton's RAAPID is located downtown and there was no staff parking available (only for the big guys, not the worker drones).
We just tend to get really snarly faxes from them with absolutely no knowledge of why the patients are coming into an outpatient clinic, other than basically saying "drop everything you are doing and fit this out of towner in"

Thank you so much for the input Fiona!

Do you remember what sort of questions they asked at the interview? I really don't know what to expect since its not an inpatient position.

Yeah, I can see people finding full-time too much much and that is what Im interviewing for, however I work on a transition unit and seeing how they all seem to be on the chopping block I figure I better find something else before its too late.

Fiona59 · May 23, 2013

A lot of the questions were what you'd expect about care and treatment of diabetics! I think they used the standard interview questions.

Then they tossed in how do you deal with difficult situations/coworkers/demanding doctors type questions.

Basically, it was a crap shoot of an interview.

And by the end of mine, I knew that it wasn't a good idea to be in the first hiring wave because they didn't know what they were planning on doing.

lilaclover6984 · May 23, 2013

A lot of the questions were what you'd expect about care and treatment of diabetics! I think they used the standard interview questions.
Then they tossed in how do you deal with difficult situations/coworkers/demanding doctors type questions.
Basically, it was a crap shoot of an interview.
And by the end of mine, I knew that it wasn't a good idea to be in the first hiring wave because they didn't know what they were planning on doing.

Thank you so much! That helps ease my nerves a bit. It's kind of funny that they would even ask clinical questions since there is no direct patient care involved with the job. But I guess they want to see that you are a decent nurse.

Fingers crossed!!!

Fiona59 · May 23, 2013

They really stressed that they wanted experienced, hospital nurses. Made sense really because of the discharge planning.

It's not the place for new grads or nurses who have spent all their time in clinics.

lilaclover6984 · May 23, 2013

They really stressed that they wanted experienced, hospital nurses. Made sense really because of the discharge planning.
It's not the place for new grads or nurses who have spent all their time in clinics.

I've got 5 years of hospital experience and am oriented as the first Charge LPN on my unit (transition) so have completed all the same charge nurse training that the RN's do. Because of this I am heavily involved in discharge planning on my unit. Hopefully this will be of benefit to me in getting this job.

lilaclover6984 · May 23, 2013

Also I don't know if all the lines with RAAPID are like this, but the one I applied to is Mon- Fri. I think it would be awesome to be on track with the rest of the world especially since I've spent the last year and a half on straight nights.

Fiona, do you know if all the lines there are Mon- Fri?