Hi I’m Owen!
I was a Health Care Assistant for 13 years across different health boards. I am currently in year two of a BSc Nursing degree course at the University of South Wales.
Owen
Where do you work?
The Coronary Care Unit (CCU) is an acute unit within the Specialities directorate. CCU is an 8 bedded unit which takes the sickest patients within cardiology and gives high dependency care to them, this is usually following a Myocardial Infarction (MI) or heart attack.
My typical day
It’s quite difficult to tell of a ‘typical day’ because no two days are the same.
The day will start with a ‘handover’ where the nurse in charge of the previous shift will tell the staff the background of the patients currently occupying the unit. This will be their personal details, past medical history and then their reason for being on the unit.
The plan for the patient is usually handed over as well although the information is usually on a printed handover sheet. We would usually start by assisting patients to have a wash and freshen up after they’ve been given breakfast and if they are able to get out of bed, we would encourage this as it is better for them to be out of bed and sat up to assist with recovery.
What else do you do as a Health Care Support Worker?
As a HCA we make sure that equipment is readily available for any unforeseen incidents as well as routine equipment is available.
- We can be asked to accompany a patient to a different department for a scan for example as they would need to be transferred on an Automatic Electronic Defibrillator (AED) and then patients need to be monitored when off the ward.
- We can also help with physiological observations such as blood pressure, oxygen saturation and heart rate monitoring.
- There are times when we may have to assist patients with eating and drinking as well as assisting with end-of-life care or preparing a deceased patient for family to visit or getting them ready to make their journey to the mortuary.