In order to understand what a dialysis technician does, you first need to fully understand the process of dialysis. This is a medical procedure where waste and extra fluids are removed from the blood and body of someone who has kidney disease or kidney failure. This procedure does what a healthy kidney would do on its own.
Dialysis Technician Work
What a technician does is operate the machines that are responsible for doing this procedure. They also help monitor patients as the dialysis takes place. Dialysis technicians are also sometimes called patient care technicians. They must have knowledge of many important protocols and follow them to the letter to ensure the best outcome for the patient.
Important Tasks Done by Technicians
When you think about the most important thing that dialysis technicians do, its probably going to be adjusting the fluid removal rate and monitoring a patients vial signs during the dialysis. They also are responsible for ensuring that proper sterilization and equipment handling is done to avoid a higher chance of infection.
Reasons for Dialysis
If you look at the information on the National Institute of Health website, it states that the most common reason for dialysis is when a person has end-stage renal disease. This is a disease that is characterized by kidneys that are only capable of doing 10% of the work of a normal, healthy kidney. This disease is most often a result of diabetes.
Important Skills
Those who plan to do dialysis technician work will need to have a few crucial skills to do well at the job. These dialysis technicians are caregivers for people who need to undergo dialysis. Sometimes this might mean undergoing the procedure three times in a single week. This means that it is important for a technician to be empathetic, detail oriented, and responsible while doing their job.
Outlook for Dialysis Technicians
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics keeps track of how many jobs are expected in various careers over time. Based on this, it is believed that social assistance and health care will generate nearly four million jobs between 2014 and 2024. Tens of millions of Americans have kidney disease, with many more with diabetes that may lead to it. As such, it is expected that the career will grow nearly 20% between 2014 and 2024.
