As Surgical Tech Booms, Community Colleges Train Students To Keep Up With Changing Field

Technology continues to transform operating rooms, and community colleges in North Texas that prepare surgical technologists should evolve, too.

For students that can conform to ever-changing surgical methods and new high-tech resources, the chances of finding well-paying jobs in the area are great, with a projected growth of 15 percent within the 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 certainly one of our mannequins that individuals 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 the time. He's in one of many 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 can," Allen says. "So when the students have been in the role here, should they drop something and it's non-sterile, they have to go and get a new one."

It truly is pristine, as a result of the steam sterilizer down the hall.

Student Matty Hutyra stands close to the dummy. She highlights dozens of instruments.

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

Leshi remembers when El Centro didn't have the sterilizer or some 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 Used to do was an open, abdominal appendicitis," Leshi recalls. "Now, we're taking out the appendix with laparoscopy — minimally invasive, so that they'll recover quickly and return to work."

There's a lot of work for students in this field. Workforce Solutions of Greater Dallas projects 1,500 jobs this season alone. Nationally, the U.S. If you adored this article therefore you would like to be given more info concerning surgical tech salary please visit our page. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects surgical tech jobs will grow rapidly — 15 percent through the entire year 2024.

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

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

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

"Each day, the robotic system is being found in more and more surgeries; also the minimally invasive versus the open procedures," Allen says.

Several surgical technology students wind up devoted to a field like obstetrics and gynecology, orthopedics or vascular surgery.

Student Amanda Scott hasn't picked a niche yet, but likes her job prospects irrespective of the focus. She says she can work anywhere in the country. And graduates with a two-year associate's degree may quickly find jobs paying significantly more than $40,000 a year.