As Surgical Technology Booms, Community Colleges Train Students To Keep Up With Adjusting Field

Technology remains to change operating rooms, and community colleges in North Texas that train surgical technologists should evolve, too.

For students that can adapt to ever-changing surgical strategies and new high-tech tools, the chances of obtaining well-paying jobs in the area are excellent, with a projected growth of 15 percent next several years.

A dozen El Centro College students are busy prepping their patient for surgery: T. M. Robert, eyes wide open, lies motionless under a sterile sheet.

"That is among our mannequins that we use," Belinda Allen says. She's the director of El Centro's surgical technology program.

Clinical coordinator Aisha Leshi explains: "That is Trauma Man Bob."

Trauma Man Bob hangs out here all of the time. If you loved this short article and you would certainly like to receive even more facts concerning surgical tech salary kindly visit our website. He's in one of the college's four mock operating rooms in downtown Dallas. Allen explains the day's lesson: gowning, gloving and sterilizing.

"We ensure it is as real as you are able to," Allen says. "So once the students have been in the role here, if they drop something and it's non-sterile, they've to go and obtain a new one."

It truly is pristine, because of the steam sterilizer down the hall.

Student Matty Hutyra stands alongside the dummy. She highlights lots of instruments.

"Sponge holding forceps. You know you've your lap bands here, your Raytek bands." She continues the list. "This is a baby Richardson Retractor. And see both of these, they're a similar thing, but they're just smaller."

Leshi remembers when El Centro didn't have the sterilizer or any of these instruments. When she graduated from here 27 years back, Leshi only had pictures of the hand tools, until she began clinical training.

"My first appendicitis that I did so was an open, abdominal appendicitis," Leshi recalls. "Now, we're taking out the appendix with laparoscopy — minimally invasive, so that they may recover quickly and get back to work."

There's a lot of benefit students in this field. Workforce Solutions of Greater Dallas projects 1,500 jobs in 2010 alone. Nationally, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects surgical tech jobs will grow rapidly — 15 percent through the entire year 2024.

"My main surgical technologist, Sandra, sort of knows what can be substituted in, in case a particular piece is missing. She knows what's like enough to be able to get by, and she also knows when it is a hard stop. And so it is a huge element of what allows me to be successful in what I really do," Oltmann says.

In El Centro's operating room, students read the laparoscopy machine. Surgical technologists are responsible for keeping its tiny, state-of-the-art cameras and skinny wires working because they thread via a patient's blood vessels.

About the only bit of surgical equipment not at El Centro is just a robot. At a lot more than $1 million, Belinda Allen says it's too pricey.

"Every day, the robotic system has been used in more and more surgeries; also the minimally invasive versus the open procedures," Allen says.

Several surgical technology students find yourself devoted to a subject like obstetrics and gynecology, orthopedics or vascular surgery.

Student Amanda Scott hasn't picked a niche yet, but likes her job prospects no matter the focus. She says she can work anywhere in the country. And graduates with a two-year associate's degree may quickly discover careers paying significantly more than $40,000 a year.