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Duties &
Responsibilities:
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Job Summary
The Respiratory Care Practitioner performs direct patient care to patients in all aspects of respiratory care according to the physician’s orders/approved protocols, with consideration given to the age of the patient. Consults physicians on the effectiveness of therapy and makes appropriate recommendations. Provides appropriate ventilation support, maintains and monitors other pulmonary life support equipment. Maintains and properly utilizes respiratory equipment.
Duties
- Identifies breath sounds, recognizes abnormal breath sounds, recognizes abnormal arterial blood gases, identifies amount and character of secretions, determine need for supplemental oxygen/suction
- Reports changes in patient’s status to charge nurse or physician and staff caring for patient
- Documents Respiratory Care consistent with hospital charting standards
- Complies with hospital policy for receiving doctor’s orders, including verbal and phone
- Accurately gives report to oncoming shift
- Reports extraordinary patient problems to supervisor, director or administrator as necessary
- Complies with hospital policies and procedures for selected precautions, i.e.; seizure, suicide
- Uses principles of body mechanics in mobilizing patient or objects
- Asks for help when lifting heavy patients
- Complies with policies for restraints
- Complies with policies for electrical safety
- Checks the Emergency Equipment policy
- Incorporates infection control principles in practice
- Demonstrates skills related to the management of emergency situations
- Complies with policy for cardio-pulmonary arrest
- Demonstrates competency for ABG drawing and sampling
- Demonstrates competency for Quality Control and ABG analyzers
- Demonstrates skills to trouble shoot ABG analyzers
- Demonstrates skills to run PFT screens
- Complies with Policy and Procedure for oxygen
- Complies with Policy and procedure for ventilator care
- The RCP should possess a wide range of psychomotor or mechanical skills so that decisional, educational and administrative skills requiring eye-hand coordination, manual dexterity and sensory perception can be applied efficaciously in diagnosing and treating the critically ill patient. These psychomotor skills include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Ability to perform physical assessment of the patient through the use of a stethoscope, blood pressure apparatus, respirometer, pressure manometer, and other instruments in addition to the use of the practitioner’s tactile, auditory, and olfactory senses
- Visual recognition of common signs of illness and distress is paramount
- Ability to perform arterial puncture successfully, expeditiously, and traumatically for the purpose of determining the arterial blood gas/acid-base status
- Ability to use safely indwelling arterial, venous and intracardiac or intrapulmonary catheters to obtain blood samples for analysis or vascular pressure measurements
- Ability to correctly maintain, operate, calibrate, and troubleshoot blood gas analyzers, Oximetry and related instrumentation
- Ability to perform efficacious and atraumatic nasotracheal suction or tracheal lavage to maintain bronchopulmonary hygiene
- Ability to perform basic life support maneuvers efficaciously, such as maintenance of a patent anatomical airway, external cardiac compression, and artificial ventilation by way of mouth-to-mouth, bag-and-mask and related ventilatory techniques
- Ability to maintain, monitor, measure and adjust mechanical lung ventilators appropriately to assure proper function and to ascertain therapeutic effectiveness
- Ability to measure, using appropriate available instrumentation, the following: variables of ventilatory gas exchange, and Hemodynamic function: respiratory rate; tidal and minute ventilation; dead space ventilation; alveolar-to-arterial P02 gradient; intrapulmonary shunt fraction; respiratory mechanics, including total resistance and static and dynamic compliance; Hemodynamic variables that may include pulse rate, blood pressure, ventricular stroke work; and oxygenation variables that may include arterial and mixed venous oxygen contents and total systemic oxygen contents and total systemic oxygen transport
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Other Info:
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Lifting requirements:
While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to stand, use hands to handle or feel objects. The employee is frequently required to walk or stand for extended periods, occasionally required to sit, balance; stoop, kneel or crouch.
Some lifting requirements and moving of equipment will be necessary usually less than 50 lbs. Will need to learn proper patient repositioning and lifting skills.
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