Career Central

Position Summary:Provide clinical respiratory care. Access, evaluate and recommend intervention to obtain specific patient outcomes. Assemble, operate and troubleshoot various types of respiratory equipment used in diagnosis and treatment of respiratory disease, disability, impairment and illness. Ensure adherence to Hospital and Departmental Policies, Procedures and guidelines. Patient care assignment may include; Neonate, Pediatric, Adolescent, Adult and Geriatric age groups.Accountability:

PATIENT CARE - Provide patients education and consultation on disease management

CUSTOMER SERVICE - Ensure customer and patient satisfaction using scripting procedure

ADMINISTER - Access patient, administer and evaluate appropriate respitory therapy, including aerosolized medication delivery, chest physiotherapy, intermittent positive pressure breathing, oxygen supplementation, pulmonary hygiene, artificial airway care, tracheostomy care including patient education, incentive spirometry, non-invasive and invasive procedures

PERFORM - Perform as a resource for certified respiratory therapy technicians and respiratory therapy assistants

ASSIST - Assist healthcare team managing patients on mechanical ventilators, monitor patients requiring mechanical life support. Follow weaning guidelines/protocols to ensure appropriate duration of mechanical ventilation

RECOMMEND - Recommend appropriate mode of ventilatory support to physicians. Participate with critical care team on patient rounds and teaching

PARTICIPATE - Participate in Hospitals cardiopulmonary resuscitation team. Provide airway maintenance, manual resuscitation and chest compression during Dr Heart codes. Assist with endotracheal tube insertion, stabilazation and continued ventilatory support

PARTICIPATE - Participate with Hospitals trauma team. Respond to trauma pages. Assist with intubation, airway management and ventilator support. Assist with internal transport of ventilator and patient

PARTICIPATE - Participate with Hospitals high-risk labor and delivery team. Respond to high-risk delivery pages and provide airway management, assist with intubation and stabilazation of the endotracheal tube, administer surfactant if ordered by physician, provide ventilator support

PERFORM - Perform arterial puncture for blood gas analysis. Run blood gas sample for analysis. Interpret arterial blood gas and electrolite results

PROVIDE - Provide recommendations for therapy and appropriate ventilation based on lab results

PERFORM - Perform simple bedside pulmonary function tests on intubated and non-intubated patients. Make recommendations for therapy and ventilator support

PERFORM - Perform oximetry for arterial oxygen saturation evaluation. Setup, evaluate and monitor ETCO2 and sleep study monitoring

INITIATE - Receive and initiate physician's orders for respiratory care, including verbal orders under Hospitals policy

PROVIDE - Provide patient clinical assessment; evaluate patient criteria for appropriateness of, and compliance with, therapeutic objectives

ADMINISTER - Administer and monitor medical gases and environmental control systems including oxygen, compressed air, heliox, nitrogen, and nitric oxide. Participate in medical gas failure emergencies and planned outages

ADMINISTER - Administers aerosolized pharmacological agents, calculate dosages for continuous aerosolized therapy. Transition parients from aerosol delivery to MDIs according to department guidelines

ASSIST - Assist facility maintenance, maintain equipment, lable and route malfunctioning equipment to appropriate location

PATIENT CARE - Collaborate with healthcare team to implement and document in individual plan of care with age specific considerations. Include discharge plan and patient/family teaching

PATIENT SAFETY 1 - Follow patient safety-related policies, procedures and protocols

PATIENT SAFETY 2 - Demonstrate proactive approach to patient safety by seeking opportunities to improve patient safety through questioning of current policies and processes

PATIENT SAFETY 3 - Identify and report/correct environmental conditions and/or situations that may put a patient at undue risk

PATIENT SAFETY 4 - Report potential or actual patient safety concerns, medical errors and/or near misses in a timely manner

PATIENT SAFETY 5 - Encourage patients to actively participate in their own care by asking questions and reporting treatment or situations that they don't understand or may "not seem right"

Education Requirements:

Associate's Degree in related discipline

Experience Requirements:

Hospital respiratory therapy equipment - ability to operate

Respiratory care therapy, applications and side effects comprehensive knowledge

Licensure/Certification Requirements:

Respiratory Care Practitioner in State of New Mexico

Registered Respiratory Therapist credentials from the National Board for Respiratory Care

CPR Certification for Healthcare/BLS Providers or for Professional Rescuers or must obtain within 30 calendar days of date of position

Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) Certification within 1 year from date of position

Experience Requirements - Preferred:

Bilingual English/Spanish

Bilingual English/Keres, Tewa, Tiwa, Towa, Zuni, or Navajo

3 years directly related experience

Physical Demands Requirements:

Heavy Work: Exerting 50 to 100 pounds of force occasionally, and/or 25 to 50 pounds of force frequently, and/or 10 to 20 pounds of force constantly to move objects or people. Physical Demand requirements are in excess of those for Medium Work.

Testing Requirements:

Tuberculin Skin Test required annually

Working Conditions Requirements:

Med Haz: Mod exposure to chemicals, dangerous equipment and/or materials requiring basic safety precautions

May be required or is required to perform on-call duties

May be required to work rotating shifts, holidays and weekends

May be required to perform subordinate tasks in high census/vol