Regardless of where you work in respiratory care, you are likely to be touched in some way by National Respiratory Care Week this week. Maybe your hospital is hosting a special breakfast for staff. Maybe your manager is handing out RC Week merchandise. Maybe your educational coordinator has a great lineup of continuing education for you to participate in.
They’re all designed to boost career morale, and by all accounts, they do just that.
You probably have a favorite RC Week activity you look forward to every year. RC Week organizers have a few favs of their own too.
Escape this!
“Personally, I love RC Week and the opportunity to celebrate ourselves — our profession and our team. This is our week, we have to own it and make it count,” said Amanda Richter, MHA, RRT, RRT-ACCS, RRT-NPS, RPFT, FACHE, pulmonary services operations manager at WellSpan Health-York Hospital in York, PA.
She’s been involved in organizing RC Week events since she was a staff therapist and believes her efforts on behalf of the week have made her more visible in the departments she has worked in and helped pave the way for her leadership positions.
Her favorite RC Week activity took place last year when she was still managing an RT department at a hospital in Texas.
“Our team built a respiratory-themed escape room,” Richter said. “It not only brought together the team that worked hard on creating the puzzles and physically building the room, but also each of the teams that attempted the game.”
The escape room was paired with a department open house, other games and activities, and lots of food and goodies as well. “It was so much fun!” Richter said.
Conversation starter
At Shawnee State University in Portsmouth, OH, RT Program Director Amy France, MS, RRT, and her students use RC Week to promote the profession through a variety of activities and events.
“Every year we set up tables in our University Center and provide screenings, education, and promotion,” France said. “The students also bring in candy, baked goods, and drinks in baskets with cards for our area clinical sites as a thank you and Happy RCW.”
But the thing that really makes their efforts stand out from the crowd? Gigantic lungs borrowed from a local medical center! Students who come through the University Center on their way to and from classes cannot miss the massive inflatable, and it always serves to get the conversation started.
“We try to get the students involved as much as possible to promote the profession and also give them pride in their career choice,” France said.
Nothing says pride in respiratory care more than a super-sized set of lungs!
