Advice on Phlebotomy

charliej

Do you mean working in a hospital as a phlebotomist? If so your local hospital should advertise if there are jobs going. It only takes like 6 wk to train to.

no it doesn't, it takes a few days.
Phlebotomy is easy to learn, hard to master.

incidentally check around your local hospitals. some will train you for free and thn pay you. others will want you to pay for your training, and then won't pay you for work.

Reply 4

yoshin

OP

Thanks for that.

Does anyone know if its possible to get in to medicine through extra or clearing?????

Reply 5

yoshin

Thanks for that.

Does anyone know if its possible to get in to medicine through extra or clearing?????

is that a joke?
:confused:

Reply 6

iceman_jondoe

yoshin

Thanks for that.

Does anyone know if its possible to get in to medicine through extra or clearing?????

yeah its possible but its very hard to. But there is no harm in trying

Reply 7

iceman_jondoe

yeah its possible but its very hard to. But there is no harm in trying

possible?
do you realise the odds..?

Reply 8

Robot Chicken

no it doesn't, it takes a few days.
Phlebotomy is easy to learn, hard to master.

incidentally check around your local hospitals. some will train you for free and thn pay you. others will want you to pay for your training, and then won't pay you for work.

It does take 6 weeks actually. the national assocation of phlebotomists specify this.

Thanks fruit cake!

Although I agree that phlebotomy will be a very useful skill to have when you eventually do become a doctor (trust me, you may think that as a doctor you can just ask phlebs to take your bloods but after hours there's just you and you'd be surprised how often the phlebs fail anyway...) I'm not sure it'll be the best choice for your gap year.
1) I suspect it'll get boring after only a month or two
2) Auxiliary nursing/health care assistant/nursing home carer will demonstrate far more of your 'caring' side than being a phlebotomist.

I could be wrong but that's my impression.

Reply 11

FruitcakeLiz

It does take 6 weeks actually. the national assocation of phlebotomists specify this.

oh ok, i must have done a different phlebotomy course.
O wait no, a direct quote from the national assoc
"Training to become a Phlebotomist should take up to six months"
UPTO

in fact you do a few days training then are practically unsupervised from there on in.

And i agree anita, except i had a friend who did it for a few months (note months not a year!) during his summer to gain some cash. Phlebs get some good money, he was making over £10 an hour.

Reply 12

I'm a phlebotomist. Yes the money's very good. Robotchicken- yes it may differ from trust to trust, but most work on the 6 week guidelines AT LEAST before you can work unsupervised. It can cause them too many problems otherwise (eg litigation side of things). I am very suprised if you worked un supervised after a few days of training!

It doesn't get boring at all- i rotate between wards and clinics and becuase i'm going to do medicine they send me on lots of fun random courses like cannulation.

And anita the med schools regard it very highly, before i got the job and was comparing it to HCA work i spoke to admissions people and they said that it would look just as good, if not better, than HCA work. It's better paid and more fun (in my opinion) anyway, and i kept up the care side of things with voluntary work.

Reply 13

see when i said practically unsupervised i meant doing phleb in a phleb clinic, not going about the wards on my own!
hence the practically bit. i called always have called one of the older nurses in to help me if i needed to.

Of course then months later i tried to take blood froma lady, having forgot just about everything i knew inside out. (i must have been having a bad day, needless to say my bad day became a bad day for this poor lady.

The cubital vein stopped producing after 2 vials, so i figured i had best switch to the hand (it wasn't coming no matter what i did.
unfortunately in my haste i not only didn't press cotton wool on when i removed the needle, i didn't even take off the tourniquet.
O, and she was on heparin.

Blood. Everywhere.

Reply 14

Robot Chicken

see when i said practically unsupervised i meant doing phleb in a phleb clinic, not going about the wards on my own!
hence the practically bit. i called always have called one of the older nurses in to help me if i needed to.

Of course then months later i tried to take blood froma lady, having forgot just about everything i knew inside out. (i must have been having a bad day, needless to say my bad day became a bad day for this poor lady.

The cubital vein stopped producing after 2 vials, so i figured i had best switch to the hand (it wasn't coming no matter what i did.
unfortunately in my haste i not only didn't press cotton wool on when i removed the needle, i didn't even take off the tourniquet.
O, and she was on heparin.

Blood. Everywhere.

oooooo I seee- your posts make much more sense now!!! Yeah i worked practically unsupervised in the clinic while i was still training, it just took 6 weeks before they let you on ward rounds.

Poor you- i know what you mean about bad days, sometimes you just have days where every single venepuncture goes wrong no matter what....

Reply 15

belis

17

How did you actualy go round getting a job as a phlebotomist. They are not much of those adveritsed and if so they usualy ask for somone trained and with experience. Did you just phone the recruitment department at hospital you wanted to work?

Reply 16

No i looked on NHS jobs, and it said they would train you so i applied.

Reply 17

belis

17

I hope a post like that will come along in my area as well.

Reply 18