Systems – Page 17 – Maria Yang, MD

Who works at a hospital? (Again, just indulge me for now.)

Doctors. If you’re a patient at a teaching hospital, this includes medical students (people in school to become doctors), interns and residents (people who have earned the title of “doctor”, but who are still learning their craft), and attendings (people who have completed their formal training as physicians). If you’re not at a teaching hospital, it’s less likely you’ll see medical students and other trainees (the army of white coats tromping through the hallways). Instead, you’ll see lone attending physicians.

Nurses. Nurses play vital roles in patient care; without them, hospitals simply would not work. Nurses arguably spend the most time with patients. They monitor and observe patients around the clock. As a result, they’re often the first to realize that something has changed and thus have the responsibility to do something about it.

There are different kinds of nurses, such as registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, and certified nursing assistants. Their roles differ in terms of their training, skill sets, and responsibilities, but they all serve to observe and monitor patients and their conditions.

Therapists. Not the talky kind. There are respiratory therapists, speech therapists, physical therapists, and occupational therapists. They focus on skills and function: How can we help this patient walk? How can we help this patient talk with less difficulty? How can we retrain the muscles in this patient’s hand so he can write again?

Technicians. Radiology technicians, pharmacy technicians, surgical technicians, electroencephalogram technicians, patient care technicians… the list is long. They assist other professionals in the hospital in their duties and may have more contact with patients that the professionals themselves.

Consider an ultrasound technician. A physician may order the ultrasound, but it is the technician who will explain to the patient what an ultrasound is and perform the procedure. A radiologist will interpret the results.

A special note about patient care technicians (PCTs): These individuals often spend the most time with patients and are often a treasure trove of data for nurses and physicians. If you are a physician working in a hospital, make a point of talking with the PCTs. They’re the ones who will know if the patient slept, went to a procedure, has a change in mental status, etc.

Janitorial staff. These individuals have one of the most important jobs in the hospital: They help with hospital-wide infection control. They help prevent people from getting more sick. If you work in a hospital, thank a janitor today for what they do.

Clerical staff. This includes the clerks who serve as receptionists for the hospital units (not an easy job: imagine juggling phone calls from patients, managing the anxiety of family members of patients, paging physicians multiple times because they don’t call back…), hospital operators, all the people working in medical records, and the staff who work with the hospital administrators. Hospitals generate a lot of data. Someone has to help manage and organize all that data.

Information technology staff. Electronic health records now hold patient information. The networks fails. The mouse doesn’t work. There aren’t enough terminals. Someone can’t remember their password. The radiology images aren’t showing up. The orders didn’t go through. The IT department gets a lot of pressure to get it all right.

Food services staff. There are all the people who cook hospital meals, transport and deliver the meals to each patient, and wash the leftover dishes. These people also prepare the food in the hospital cafeteria, which feeds the rest of us who are well enough to get it on our own.

People want to eat and they want to eat food that tastes good. In the hospital it is hard to please all of the people all of the time.

Environmental services staff. These are the plumbers, electricians, HVAC experts, etc. who make sure that the electricity stays on, that there are backup generators available, that the water temperatures are satisfactory, that the ambient temperatures are within a certain range, that the windows seal tight, etc. If the building doesn’t “work”, then the hospital doesn’t work.

Pharmacy staff. I don’t know how many thousands of medications are available, but the pharmacy takes care of all of them. Whether they are amazing antibiotics that will drip through an IV or cartons of chicken soup (yes, doctors can order chicken soup), the pharmacy takes all of those orders and fills them. They ensure that medications are available in every single hospital unit and prepare medications for patients to take with them when they leave the hospital. And they have to make sure that they fill the right drug at the right dose at the right time for the right person.

There are many more people who work in hospitals; I do not omit them willfully. We often take for granted all the people who make a hospital work.

If you are a patient (or someone visiting a patient) in a hospital, I encourage you to thank all the people who have helped you. Hospital staff appreciate hearing that and want to know that their actions made a difference.

If you work in a hospital (especially physicians), I encourage you to thank your colleagues, particularly those who have a completely different job from yours. They are doing something to help you do your work. Let them know that you appreciate it.

Next time: The “rules” of the hospital.

So what is a hospital? (Just work with me here.)

Hospitals are physical structures. They are buildings that have rooms and beds. People, who become “patients”, are “admitted” into a hospital and assigned a bed. Because patients receive a bed, there is an assumption that they will be in the hospital for at least one night. This is called an “inpatient” admission, because the patient is “in” the hospital. (Contrast this to a visit to a clinic, which is called an “outpatient” encounter.)

Hospitals provide acute health care. “Acute” can mean “intense” (like cutting someone open to remove an organ or the delivery of a baby in a mother who has major medical problems) or “fast” (like giving a patient antibiotics through a vein to fight an infection or using a machine to help filter blood when a patient’s kidneys suddenly stop working).

Because most hospitals offer services from nearly every medical specialty, patients can experience “one stop shopping” for acute health care issues. Patients might see four different kinds of doctors, have numerous tubes of blood drawn, undergo five imaging studies, receive education from dieticians, undergo strength training with physical therapists, and talk with pharmacists about their medications.

Hospitals permit around-the-clock observation of patients. This is directly related to the previous point and is arguably the primary reason why people are in hospitals. If someone does not require frequent and regular observation, then she doesn’t need to be in the hospital. All that staffing and equipment in the hospital serve to monitor patients and their health (heart function, breathing, infection, etc.). If medical staff observe an acute change, they can then deliver an acute intervention.

Hospitals are businesses. Hospitals, like hotels, want a low vacancy rate, as this is how they make money. Sometimes patients are ushered out of the hospital sooner than expected because other patients are waiting for open beds. (I’ve worked in hospitals where, in the morning, the operators announced over the intercom a “code” about bed status. This was a discreet message to hospital staff about the census. If the census was high, then we were to try to discharge patients if we could.) Sometimes patients are welcome to stay in the hospital for another night because the census is low. This is not actually a good thing. (The longer someone stays in the hospital, he is at higher risk of developing an infection from the hospital. This is bad because infections that originate in the hospital are often resistant to available antibiotics. Furthermore, patients often get “deconditioned” because they aren’t moving around as they usually do. As muscles, stamina, and endurance weaken, that can cause problems with mobility and function.)

Hospitals are not places of rest. While it is true that people can recover in hospitals, that doesn’t mean that people recover in peace. Hospitals are often noisy places with frequent, unexpected intrusions because of all the observation, testing, and services that occur there.

Now that we have a general sense of what hospitals are, we’ll talk next about all the people who work in hospitals.