I am currently
working as a respiratory therapist (RT) at Vancouver General Hospital (VGH). I love my job, it's everything I could ask for. I
care for patients by evaluating, treating, and maintaining cardiopulmonary
function. I cover all areas of the hospital but particularly high-risk and
critical care (Intensive Care, and Emergency) areas. While I enjoy all aspects
of my job I thrive when I am working with the code blue team or the trauma team
in the Emergency Department (ED). I have always worked well in stressful
situations.
Last
summer I was working in the ED and I got a call that a large motor vehicle
accident what going to arrive in 15min. We only know that it was multiple
vehicles and we would receive up to 10 patients and that at least four of them
where critically ill. I had to jump to action. I called for other RTs working
in different areas to come down as I would be unable to manage so many patients
on my own. I started organizing for intubation and getting various bedsides
ready. I was in charge of leading an organizing our group of RTs to ensure each
patient coming in could be managed, I would also be in charge of prioritizing
who receive our care if we became overwhelmed. We ended up receiving three very
ill patients (a fourth passed away on route), they all required to be incubated
an put on breathing machines, two required massive transfusion protocols, and
they all needed to get life saving operations. At one point we ran out of blood
to transfuse them with. It was the most chaotic hour of my life but it was
organized chaos. We had teams and leaders for each team and we coordinated via
the charge nurse who was overseeing the entire event. All three of them
survived but we where stretched to our maximum. I started thinking about what
if we had more critically ill patients, one more patient and we may not have
been able to offer them the same level of care as the first three. What if
there where many more?
That
event started me looking into disaster and emergency planning. I read books on
disaster planning and past disasters. I started talking to various managers
about Code Orange planning and how our hospital would deal with a major event.
I found out that most of the people who are in charge of code orange training
were self taut and do not have formal training. I found the Royal Roads program
via web search and it really clicked with me. There was an actual program for
what I had become profoundly interested in. I want to enrol in this program
because I want to know how best to prepare for emergencies and disasters. I
want to learn about all aspects from pre-planning for emergencies and disasters,
to how to manage an actual disaster.
End Note: So here I am already five weeks in! I should be doing school work but procrastination comes along with school for me. So far I'm loving the program, it's incredibly interesting and engaging. I'll write more on the program later. What I have realized as I go along is having a learning disability does not make me any less capable. I am proud to say I am an excellent RT and an excellent student. I just have to adapt sometimes. Most of the time it's not even noticeable, I wish I could tell my younger self this. I turn 30 in 2 months and I cannot complain about life. I have an amazing job, an amazing boyfriend, an amazing dog, an amazing family, amazing friends and an amazing life. The one greatest thing my job has taught me is to love life... you don't know how much time you have, so do what you love and hug people you love.
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