Monday, August 25, 2008

The Real Deal

A few months ago, when the wonderful world of RT struck my interest, I went to talk to an RT just to get a feel for what they do and what to expect. It was a great experience, it was intriguing, the RT I met with explained the daily actions of an RT. My expectation was to spend a few minutes soaking up all I could get, until the RT had to go off and preform miracles. To my surprise, as you RT's may already know, RT's are not always busy. I ended up spending a few hours talking about everything from RT school to ventilator pressures. I probably could have spent a few more hours there.
As our conversation was coming to an end, he gave me the head RT's cell number because I had asked if were possible to shadow. I thanked him and we went our separate ways.
Today, I called the head of the RT department, he was almost bothered that I had his phone number. Immediately after I stated the purpose of the phone call, he asked, "how did you get this number?!" I paused because I did not want to get the RT I had previously spoken with, in trouble. I just mentioned that I had dropped by his department to ask the RT's a few questions and they gave me the number. After that he seemed to ease his slip of anger.
During our conversation I mentioned which school I would be attending, with a sigh and hint of relief, he quick said, "the school should set up a shadow day for you then." I already knew this and explained to him that I did not want to go through the schools assigned, if not fake, job shadow day. There is no doubt that the experience would be but a mere fabricated act to entice me to join their school. He understood, and gave me the number to the HR department to set up the appointment.

To make a long story short, HR does not allow job shadows. What do I do now?? I will have to try a different hospital. We will see, I might end up having to go through the school after all. My main concern is to just experience the real deal. I hope I can.

1 comment:

Rick Frea said...

I wouldn't think there would be a problem shadowing. We have shadows here from time to time. What a better way to learn about a job than to shadow.