Surgery is hardcore. The reality of the O.R. is NOTHING like what you see on Grey's Anatomy or Scrubs. It is fast paced, demanding, and exhausting. You need to have a stomach of steel because you never know what you might see when you go in that day. Some days are slow and you might be putting ear tubes into a kid (this literally takes more time to set up for than it does to perform the seven minute surgery), other days you might have a trauma come through where there is so much blood you can't even tell where it's coming from. Most days fall somewhere in between. Allow me to be the first to tell you that life in the O.R. is never boring and it is WONDERFUL!
Most of you out there reading have probably never heard of a surgical technologist and you have no idea what we do. We have many names: surgical tech (ST), certified surgical tech (CST), operating room technician (ORT), scrub nurse, or just scrub. No matter what you call us we all do the same very important job. We set up for the surgery, maintain and protect the sterile field, and assist the surgeon in whatever he/she needs. Why is this important?
Let's start with the first duty-setting up. In the operating room we don't have the luxury of taking our time to do things. You never know when you might have an emergent case come in that requires you to have everything (drapes, sponges, scalpels, medications, instruments) set up in under five minutes. So, it's my job to be able to handle the pressure and know exactly how I like things and where to put them.
The next thing I believe is the most important task- setting up and maintaining the sterile field. We used sterile (free from all microorganisms) equipment and supplies in an effort to ensure that our patients do not leave our O.R. with a hospital acquired infection. You wouldn't believe the amount of damage a surgical site infection can do to a person. So, surgical techs learn to open up and expand the sterile field. Then they scrub their hands and arms to render them "surgically clean" and they don sterile gowns and gloves and maintain their field. It is their job to make sure anything that gets put onto the field is sterile and that no one contaminates it. By doing this, they are protecting their patient from lots and lots of postoperative pain and hassle.
The last duty I mentioned (but by no means the last thing required of a tech) is assisting the surgeon. Whatever the surgeon needs, it is the tech that makes sure it is on the sterile field and ready to go. A surgical tech must be familiar with the instruments that will be used (and there are thousands), they must know how to pass them correctly, and they learn to anticipate what the surgeon will need to that it won't be necessary for them to say "clamp" every time they need it.
This is just a brief overview of what being a surgical tech entails. I went to school for two years and studied everything from medical terminology and anatomy and physiology to healthcare law and ethics and psychology. And all that was before I even got to the classes about my major of surgical technology. I completed a 360 hour externship in a trauma level 1 hospital and required me to be two and a half hours away from home four days a week. It almost broke me. But it didn't. And now I LOVE what I do.
I'm excited to share with you guys exactly what I do every day. Of course, there are bad days and I fully intend on shining some light on them as well but for the most part I can't wait to show you all why it is that I love what I do. And who knows, maybe this will inspire you to make this your career!
Always,
Lisa Marie
