In the last two weeks we were going to ICU for some physiotherapy with the critical patients. Very overwhelming I have to say. Not a big fan of seeing human beings being so sick, so "life less", out of control of their human instincts and most importantly relying on sooo many machines. It is crazy that so much equipment is needed to keep that body alive. So we had to learn to identify and analyse all those machines and know what all those traces on the numerous monitors mean, what all those lines are and all the time staying sane and not losing control if one of the alarms go off. And believe me, there is ALWAYS something beeping....
Our role is to look after the patient's chests ie lungs and respiratory system esp if they are intubated and ventilated or newly extubated because their lung function is very compromised after surgery for example, due to pain relief or just malfunction and disease. So if the patient is unconscious we can do manual baging ie take over the role of the ventilator and ventilate the patient with a bag (how crazy is that, if u dont squeeze the bag, they wont get any air....HUGE responsibility) and by doing that giving different sort of breaths with holds to prepare the lungs and sputum for suctioning ie mobilize the sputum off the chest wall and then suction it out with the machine by putting the tube down their throat until u reach lungs and then suction it out. OH WOW! If u lucky u trigger a cough by inserting the tube which makes the suctioning quite succesfull. So strange with a patient who doesnt respond and just lies there unconsciously not even being able to breath on their own.
We also look after their arms and legs and move them so they dont stiffen up. Also bit scarry because they have lines in every possible artery and you have to be SOO fr***** careful to not disconnect or dislodge anything. While you do all this you always have to keep the monitors in sight to see if something drops, if the heart goes outta control etc pp....not easy.
Apart from that you can see all sorts of gory stuff, ie insertion of a ICC (intercostal cathether) where the put a tube into lungs between ribs to drain a pleural effusion ie liqiud for example. The one I watched was crazy, they drained like 1.6 litres of greeny water instantly....
i could ramble on forever of how much i learned in there but I think that gave you an impression of this particular role of a physiotherapist.
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