Vocera or Alternative?

Editorial Team / Admin · Jun 4, 2013

Charge nurses, specialty coordinators, circulating anesthesiologists, and patient care assistants all carry portable phones. Rooms have a board where they are supposed to hang a card with their name/number. Circulators can then call these numbers for anything they need or communicate changes.

samswim4 · Jun 22, 2013

My OR is exactly like Sweet Roses, except for our PCAs and anesthesia techs carry pagers and their pagers numbers are written on the boards of each OR. Works great, except for when my charge phone is ringing non-stop.

kguill975, MSN, APRN, NP · Jun 27, 2013

We use Cisco phones. Everybody gets one, except the scrub techs.

JoeTheRN · Jul 3, 2013

I have worked in the OR as a tech for 5 years and we have had walkie talkies (motorolla cls1110) for about 3 years now. Everyone is given a small earpiece to wear as well. Everyone was pretty resistant at first, we had nothing before, but now they are fantastic and I couldn't imagine not having one. We communicate when a PT is en route to the OR, even our scrubs wear one (usually they dont wear an ear piece) so the nurse can communicate to the scrub regarding Latex allergies. We are a teaching hospital, so our anesthesia residents can call the attending before they wake the patient up. We also can communicate to the other staff if a procedure is going from a scope to open so that we can have assistance with converting. At the end of the case we can get lifting, cleaning assistance as needed. And in the rare occasion that something goes wrong, you can say "ANESTHESIA ROOM 7 STAT!!!!" and every anesthesiologist knows exactly where to go rather than hitting the staff emergency button which is only activated in the OR, so if an attending is in PACU and we need help, then they hear us. Overall great investment in my opinion.