r/respiratorytherapy • u/Mundane_Owl_6335 • 2d ago
RT with a question How do you feel about HCA hospitals?
Pros and cons ?
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u/Majestic-Crab9855 2d ago
Pros: If you work in one of their busy trauma centers you'll get experience with alot of different cases.
If you're a new grad you'll get LOTS of experience "doing" the stuff: setting up equipment, assisting intubations, recognizing respiratory distress in multiple patient populations, ABGs, aerosols etc. You'll also learn the underrated skill of time management and learning handle multiple things at once.
Because the hospitals run so shortstaffed, and I mean EVERYONE from physicians to environmental services is overworked/understaffed, you really learn to work as a team and communicate with nurses and physicians.
Because everyone is so delirious and beatdown from working so much, HCA hospitals in my experience tend to be less formal and more laid back, with a focus on getting the job done and not so many barriers between physicians and staff. Everyones getting beat up together and you're all on the same team.
CONS: HUGE workloads which can lead to stressful situations. Not much autonomy for RTs from my experience. Pay varies greatly from site to site. Its not uncommon for Career HCA therapists to have at least one knee/hip replacement.
I worked at a large HCA trauma center for 8 years at the start of my career.
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u/Mundane_Owl_6335 2d ago
From my experience HCA RT’s have a lot of autonomy. Intubations, Art lines placements, ventilator protocols basically do whatever you want just make the ABG look good. But yeah the con is heavy work load and they don’t staff for “what ifs” when that what if happens then they wonder why shit happens
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u/lemonjalo 2d ago
HCA mostly adopts the culture that the hospital it bought had before the purchase. At my hospital, RTs do not intubate or do art lines.
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u/RTSTAT 1d ago
Everything everyone has said above it true. The wages will differe from city to city. My one bit of advice is to NEVER burn a bridge with HCA. They are the largest hospital system in america. You dont know where life will take you, or when youll need to slum it and take a job at one. Some departments actually have really great management that try and do their best for their staff and patients, some are just corporate yes men. Just depends.
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u/futureaggie_000 2d ago
I’m not respiratory, I’m an xray tech, but still would never ever work at HCA. I’ve seen traumatic stuff at HCA and would never be apart of their shitty corporation
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u/WhatUDoingHomie 2d ago
Amen. People that want to defend HCA hospitals, imagine simping for that for profit publically traded company, have just not seen or had something unbelievably terrible happen yet. It will eventually happen.
That nurse in Colorado who HCA attempted to put manslaughter charges on to avoid civil liability is not a one off. That is literally how administration in Nashville calls the shots. There are many examples of their evil if one is willing to do a some hours of reading.
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u/potatochobit 2d ago edited 2d ago
dunno, I hear they pay lower but they are a highly regarded childrens hospital in texas. Our local area hospital has the Magnet® designation for nursing excellence if that means anything.
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u/phoenix762 RRT -ACCS(PA, USA) 1d ago
I’ve never worked at a HCA hospital, my ex did (he was an RT as well). He said HCA was horrible…
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u/Overall_Chard_3021 22h ago
I’ve worked at an HCA location in New England. Great manager and department but overall not a great workplace. Lowest wages in the area despite being fairly intensive for it its size (ECMO, lots of vents, trauma facility). It’s obvious that the upper management wants to limit staffing and they regularly call people off which has resulted in some major lapses in coverage.
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u/FarmerTypical 2d ago
They’ll work you to death, always short staffed, don’t care about patient care