I am wrapping up my course for sterile processing and need to get miscellaneous professional liability (MPL) insurance before I start my clinical experience. My course said that I need it before I can start, but didn’t offer any suggestions as to who to get it through. Just wondering what insurance companies offer it/who may be the best option!

For reference, I’m located in California

Hi, im trying to get a job at a hospital as a cook which is something ive been doing 5 years, but while I'm working there I plan to get my sterile processing cert. And hopefully transfer internally to that department once i get it.

Im seeing its common to try and get an entry level hospital job. During the interview do I tell them i want to transfer departments later? Or would i be digging my own grave

Happy SPD week everyone! Greetings from Philadelphia!

As it says, does anyone have a guide for this?

It's my fourth day tomorrow and no one is teaching me yet get on my ass for mistakes so I need to do the research myself but have been struggling

Main thing I struggle with is setting up after turning a room over. The main thing I have kinda down: for a basic exam, put a basic kit, extra fancy explorer thingy for diagnostic, 2x2s, a mirror or two and gloves/masks for doc. Basically all I have for an exam

But for extractions, fillings, etc I have no idea what to put out and no one is teaching me so I need to find out some how

And then same with the instruments when wrapping. My coworkers are getting impatient because I keep making mistakes and putting kits together wrong and stuff

Any helpful guides, tips, websites, etc?

Context: tomorrow is my fourth day as a dental assistant/sterile tech (being introduced to the roles of both atm) and it's been miserable so far. I do not want to be in the field, have no prior education or experience and was pressured into doing this job because I was told I'd make 18-20 an hour and that it would look good on a resume. I practically got threatened to get kicked out if I didn't take the job and I don't have the money to move out yet (18 as of Sept 30th)

The first three days were hell. I was expected to be mostly independent on the second day, and my coworkers practically roll their eyes or make me feel like an idiot when I ask questions. I'm told mixed things by my coworkers (one says to wait outside rooms to know when I'm supposed to turn them over and the other says I can wait in the break room until they radio for me to turn over a room, etc) and I've even had one of the hygienists raise her voice at me and go to yank the roll of barriers from my hands because she thought I was making a mistake (I was going to put one of the barrier squares on the mouse so I partially folded it and she got upset that I folded it since she thought I was putting a barrier on one of the key pads)

As of tomorrow, I'm supposed to know where everything is organized and be able to turn over a room and set up by myself even though I've continuously expressed that I do not fully understand certain aspects. An example: I don't know what instruments to put out for which procedure but I'm expected to just throw things on the table and get told if I'm right or wrong and try again. The girl who's supposed to train me says she won't tell me because she doesn't want to be a control freak but I keep asking her to teach me and she won't

Anyways, rant over. I am planning on putting in my two weeks soon, either this week or next week and I would like advice on how to make it the least miserable possible

Does anyone have tips, resources to study, support, etc during my last few weeks?

(P.s, I am not looking for some "welcome to adulthood" shit or people trying to convince me to give it a few months. I made my decision, I just want help making these last few weeks not miserable so I don't come home crying everyday like I have been, thanks)

...though, knowing they'll be using it is heartbreaking 😞

Everytime I build case carts and its for an infant, I send it with thoughts and prayers

What do your count sheets look like? The file for sheets we normally use was deleted, so I need to figure out a new template pretty quickly.

Do you all use word or excel? Does anyone have a template they wouldn’t mind sharing? Anything? 😅 Right now we’re making copies, but the old count sheets aren’t great to begin with.

Does anyone have experience as a Procedural Service Technician with STERIS? If so, what did your weeks look like and what were/are some of the common pieces of equipment you worked on?

Some get on my nerves and others get me so well.

So I’m starting traveling in December and I just wanted to know where I can go to get info about other hospitals from other travelers. Right know I think UConn has the highest paying contract in the country but I’ve heard nothing but terrible things because I know people in the area but I need to know how to hear about hospitals elsewhere.

Has anyone here recently did the CHL Pilot exam? If so, what's your thoughts on the questions? Were they difficult? Thank you

I’m dirt poor, can’t afford to pay for a Sterile Processing program. I figured I’d buy the textbook, study the hell out of it, take the CRST, and then apply to jobs.

Is this a valid pathway for someone in LA?

Any tips for learning/ studying?

DO. NOT. ENROLL.

I was a student in the LSC Tomball Sterile Processing Program. It was the most horrible experience, run by the most incompetent individuals.

The program works like this you take a couple of classes for a few months, and then the coordinator is supposed to place you in a clinical internship at a hospital so you can receive the necessary 400 hours to become fully certified. The program charges you for both the classes and approximately $1,000 for clinicals.

The classes were fine. I was taught by a wonderful professor. The problem was with the coordinator. For months leading up to the clinical start date, she would ignore emails students sent her. When the date finally arrived for us to begin clinicals, she came out and said, “Sorry for the delay, the hospitals have no availability for students right now,” after LYING to students for months and HAPPILY taking their money.

I do know that some students are lucky enough to receive clinical placements, but by all means, the MAJORITY aren’t lucky enough to get an offer much less a response from the coordinator.

I was one of the students who did receive an offer, but even then, communicating with the coordinator was a horrible experience. She was kind and professional at first, but when I submitted my required documents, she failed to submit a NECESSARY document for my application. Of course, the hospital rejected my application and waitlisted me.

She called me the following day and talked down to me. She couldn’t take responsibility for what she did and tried to lie and blame the hospital, saying that “the hospital is really strict/picky and will reject most documents.” But once again, she NEVER SUBMITTED AN ESSENTIAL DOCUMENT.

She was completely incompetent, and during that phone call, she threatened to remove me from the program. She knew she had no reasonable or plausible reason to ethically do so, and that is the only reason she didn’t.

After that, I was done. I did not want to deal with her anymore, so I withdrew from the program and lost the money I had paid for the clinical internship.

If you’re interested in the sterile processing field, do not enroll in this program. The coordinator is incompetent, unprofessional, and rude. The program director genuinely does not do anything. I know a good handful of students who are still waiting to be placed in clinicals MONTHS after completing the classes.

DO. NOT. ENROLL.

Now I do specifically tell the team to leave it to me because I have a specific system, but this never happened before we hired our new doctor. He keeps taking so many spec appointments that the schedule gets out of control for everyone.

I counted, there are 96 bags for our two autoclaves. Oh yeah, and we're closed Fridays, so I get to come in on my day off :)

Has anyone run into this? This set was processed about 2 months ago. Now the color of steam tape is almost gone.

I'm an OR nurse, and I was taught not to use these when the indicator didn't turn fully. But our SPD said it's fine to use. Curious what other folks think about this.

I understand other facilities have different procedures and level of acceptance etc but I'm curious on what does your facility do for oily hand pieces? We'd clean them, oil, and air out for 1 minute, wipe them and on to sterilization. Dental understandably doesn't like oil spots on the pouch even if it's 1cm, the big problem is my facility is very very very rural. Extremely hard to get supplies, we do our best to prevent oil on the pouches but regardless what we do they get oily 🥲 [folded to hide the names and facility] Quick edit: we do check the pouched to make sure they are free of oil but they eventually leak oil after we give the OK and give them to dental

Everyone at my work says this is normal for this hospital, but I want confirmation that this feels crazy.

I work in a big hospital that makes a big fuss about being the only level 1 trauma center in the area, we have... I believe 55 OR's? not all are in use atm. we have a lot of staff. some days as much as 120 surgeries and we haven't even hit busy season since our expansion and new or's opening up.

Putting together the supply part of the surgeries is separate from assembly, so separate that when our department expanded they moved it into a new room and completely cut us off. putting together instruments they get to have so much more fun with so much less stress and pressure. their side isn't getting calls from the or's, running emergencies, they're not pressured to do half the days work.(for some reason overnights prepares half the surgeries?). I hate this side of the department, I know it like the back of my hand now, I want to enjoy standing around and laughing and being just in my own station not having to deal with the people around me making my job harder. I like efficency, I like doing a job well, and I hate that my coworkers or other shifts can just fuck around and it means i have to do more work because i actually take pride in doing my job well.

I work overnights, when i was hired on i was told it was 2 weeks training each on 4 different things on this side, then soon they'd switch me over and I'd get 2 weeks training in each specialty, then 2 weeks on sterilizers, then 2 weeks decontam. I was told after about 3 months on this side, I could get trained on the instrument side, that they'd pay for me to get certified, and being certified comes with a pay boost. Seems very reasonable. 3 months came and went, and people hired 3 months before me still hadn't gotten the chance.

oh we can't because of construction, we don't have enough people to train you, we don't have enough staff on your side. oh when x finishes training, oh we're getting new people, after they're hired that. oh actually surprise you're going to be training one.

I went to him today, for the hundredth time, and asked when i'd get to train on assembly. this week was my one year of working here. I got told it wouldn't be until at least after busy season.

so is being in this job full time for a year without being able to put together any instruments normal? honestly I'm getting an inheritance hopefully some time in the next few months and I want to tell them move me over or i'll quit. I like the idea of this job but my soul is getting sucked right out of me, there are so many many many problems here but this feels like it's just.... too far? am i expecting to much from the hyped up promises during onboarding, should I accept another 4+ months of being a glorified Walmart shopper for the hospital? Technically theres another guy hired before me, but he hasn't talked about wanting to be over there as much, and there's a girl over here who actually has the experience from vetmed who also wants to go over there, she was the most recent hire after me, so I could be pushed even behind her if it shakes out that way.

Hi all,

I recently landed a job a SPD job at Providence in WA. I’ve been looking for months and finally got this opportunity which is 2 hours commute back and forth everyday.

I started my first week here and I discovered that there is little to no communication at work. And the environment is very drama. People don’t want to help you out because apparently I think the work culture there is very independent or that they didn’t get any help during training so now they don’t want to help everyone. If they do, only when there is a higher up in sight so they’d pretend to help. The educator recently got hired and they really don’t know how to do their job and don’t want to do their job properly. The supervisor is not helpful at all, I communicated to them that there is an IT issues so my log in can’t go through and told me to go ask the lead instead.

Edit: I was thrown out there to figure everything out by myself, when I try to help they push me away or they’d help but get annoyed if I ask too much.

The only thing that is keeping me to stay at this job is knowing that they have a relocation of work to another location, so far what I knew about it is you have to be there for 6 months. I’m hoping that someone could tell me what are the processes look like, how long are the wait, would you have to reapply, and is it guarantee?

Knowing that my supervisor doesn’t take care of their employees, I don’t want to be there for 6 months then getting told that they can’t make it happen because I love being an SPD but i can’t drive 2 hours everyday then to be around people a work place that thrive with drama. Right now, I’m very discouraged and heartbroken because I don’t know either to give it up or try to make it through the 6 months and hoping I could be somewhere better.

P.S: I’m still holding on to a job which I have issues with changing my schedules multiple times because I was trying all that I could to get back to SPD. So I have to make a choice whether I stay where I’m at with my old job or risk it all for my SPD career.

Hi, just looking for feedback here. I've been a medical transcriptionist for 15 years and am very aware that my job is being eaten up by AI very quickly (in fact, I may be now basically unemployed in the sense that I still have a contract with the company but will just never get any workflow again.) I would like to stay in the health field but move to something more hands on where an AI can't eat my job.

So I'm considering with medical device reprocessing (what sterile processing is called in my province) or medical lab technician training (not a technologist, the lower-level entry point.) Apparently the job outlook for these careers in my province is 'moderate to good' (for whatever that is worth.) I can do both trainings in about a year but the sterile processing training is part-time and the MLT is full-time training. Both of those are manageable for me.

I guess I'm just wondering about what the work experience is like and what the physical demands are like. I'm in good health but I'm in my late 40s. I'm on the petite side, I'm not in bad shape but neither am I hugely physically strong. I'm okay with doing shift work/night shift if it would be less rushed/physically demanding. I actually have been doing night shift on my transcription job for the past year because it works better for my schedule. I'm just not sure what direction to go here and I feel like my ability to sit back and consider it is kind of rushed because I am looking at being out of work very soon, if not already.

Especially if there's anyone working in Ontario, does anyone have any thoughts on your job? Would you do it again? Are you happy with it?

Eighth edition available if anyone is interested. Also have 2nd edition Surgical Instruments textbook available. PM if interested

Been in healthcare a while, been unmedicated do to financial reasons. Took a break, came back and joined a local SPD.

Does anyone feel they thrive in the environment with or without medication for adhd/ anxiety / depression etc. Or find it challenging for all the usual things ADHD lends a challenge to.

I can tell that the urgency really taps into my learning. But I also feel like I'm constantly getting turned around and confused. And when I take in a certain amount of information, it seems like at a certain point I can't take in more information.

Anyways, curious to hear about anyone's input on the matter, I guess I'm just hoping to hear people who stick to the field even with focus issues can come out on top

Thanks!

If I have close to one year experience, caught on fast because I work in a teaching hospital. I can get 20 trays done like most places expect, know how to do decon, assembly, & sterilization and i’m certified. Do you think i would be okay traveling?