ER vs ICU The Truth No One Tells You From a CNA

as cna recently moved from the intensive care unit to the emergency department and today want to discuss some of the differences that i've observed between these two units if you're looking to work in medicine this video should provide some insight as to which unit may be better fit for you and if you've already worked in one of these units go ahead and comment below about what you liked about it or didn't like let's dive in starting out with patient age now the average age of patient in the emergency department is going to be younger than that in the icu and that's because the treats everyone from newborns to centenarians meanwhile the icu solely treats adults and this is because we have specialized units for younger populations such as the nicu or neonatal intensive care unit or the picu or pediatric intensive care unit additionally even if we reduce the patient population for each unit to adults at least anecdotally it makes sense that the icu would treat older populations on average and off the cuff this makes sense as chronic diseases have had more time to progress in older patients making it more likely that they will require intensive care the second difference is pace or turnover and although the icu can get real crazy real quick the typically runs at higher rpm and this is simply due to the higher turnover rate for patients the er's job is essentially to stabilize and displace i.e discharging patient home or admitting them to the hospital meanwhile the icu is responsible for treating complex and severe illness that often necessitates lengthy stay in the hospital the size of the unit also comes into play here so for example the hospital that work in our emergency department has 38 rooms while the icu only has 14. the next comparison is use versus abuse and what mean by this is essentially that the emergency department is not always used appropriately we get patients on daily basis that don't actually require emergency level care for example patients will come in to be treated for the common cold or other things that would either likely resolve on their own or may be better suited to visit to their primary care physician conversely virtually everyone in the icu needs to be there misuse of the is complex issue with many deeply rooted problems including barriers to entry for patients to obtain adequate health insurance and primary care physician but that's another rabbit hole that we're not diving into today the next comparison is physical and mental status and again the here has pretty wide range ranging anywhere from patients that are ambulatory alert and oriented to patients that are sedated and on ventilators conversely in the icu many more patients are bedridden with many more who are sedated and on ventilators at any given time next up we have equipment and medication so your typical patient will be hooked up to the monitor to track their heart rate heart rhythm oxygen saturation and blood pressure while they may receive variety of medications many will only have single iv line running at time and some will be placed on oxygen but as with everything else the has pretty wide range here you might have patient that's not even hooked up to the vitals machine all the way to patient who has several iv lines running and is on ventilator but relatively speaking on average the patients are going to be hooked up to less than the average icu patient meanwhile icu patients are regularly hooked up to the monitor multiple iv pumps catheters bipap chest tubes and ventilators among other things and this necessitates high attention to detail and moving cautiously as with all of these different things hooked up to patient at any given time you could much more easily snag on something the last thing that want to talk about here is prognosis and this is big one there were many days in the icu especially at the height of the pandemic where it felt like we were fighting an unwinnable battle patients would come in with severe respiratory issues be placed on ventilator and then either after short period of time or long drawn-out battle they would die and even with covet aside with many patients it still felt like we were trying to fix problem that just couldn't be fixed that is old age and death medical advancement is double-edged sword it has allowed us to prolong life which of course is an incredible gift but on the other side it's also allowed for prolonged suffering for those whose family members refuse to let go of course we did have our wins in the icu but they seem to be pretty far and few between especially at the height of the pandemic and while this issue does certainly exist in the perhaps just by having younger patients on average at least for me there does appear to be greater sense of hope that we can effectively treat patients and send them home to long and healthy lives despite the differences that exist between these two units one thing holds steadfast and that is my amazement with the incredible team of men and women that comprise them it takes special kind of person to not only work but to thrive in these environments caring intelligent driven heroic i'm certainly honored to serve beside them and hope that this video has been helpful for those of you who look to do the same