272 - A Day in the Life: Cardiac Sonographer (Nygil Stifter, RDCS)

Nygil Stifter, cardiac sonographer at St. Luke's Hospital, joins Dr. Arnold to give listeners a look into a day in the life of a cardiac sonographer. He shares daily routines, education and training, why heloves working as a cardiac sonographer and so much more. 

If you're interested in a career as a cardiac sonographer at St. Luke's, visit unitypoint.org/careers.

If you have a topic you'd like Dr. Arnold to discuss with a guest on the podcast, shoot us an email at stlukescr@unitypoint.org.

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:08

This Live Well talk on a day in the life of a cardiac sonographer . I'm Dr Dustin Arnold , chief Medical Officer at Unipoint Health , st Luke's Hospital . Today's episode is another installment in a series of podcasts where we sit down with team members in various roles at Unipoint Health , cedar Rapids , and get to know them on what they do each day and how they contributed to the team and contributed patient care . Joining me today on this episode is Nigel Stifter , a cardiac sonographer with St Luke's Hospital , to discuss the role of cardiac sonographer and what they do on a daily basis . Nigel , welcome . Thank you . How long we were talking that ? You've been here 16 , almost 17 years . Yeah , you and I came at the same time . Yes , yes , that's right . We've seen a lot of change , haven't we ?

Speaker 2 0:51

We've a lot of change ? Yes , we have .

Speaker 1 0:54

But start with tell us what a cardiac sonographer is .

Speaker 2 0:57

So a cardiac sonographer uses ultrasound to look at the heart , to see how the heart's working , looks at valves and checks overall heart function .

Speaker 1 1:10

And that is something that what typical patients would have that sort of test on them .

Speaker 2 1:16

You know , it can be any patient . We can see a patient that's born that day or patient that unlikely could die that day .

Speaker 1 1:23

Okay , Wow , what kind of education got you to this position . What did you ?

Speaker 2 1:31

It's actually only a two-year degree and then you do for my schools . It was a seven-month internship .

Speaker 1 1:38

Okay , and you do that internship at a hospital with a .

Speaker 2 1:41

It is a hospital or a clinic type internship ?

Speaker 1 1:43

yes , and it's . There's a shortage of cardiac stenographers . There's a big shortage . Yes , yeah , you've been the mainstay here for a long time , but I mean it's . We probably had about a third as many as we could have .

Speaker 2 1:57

Very much so . We need a lot of cardiac stenographers .

Speaker 1 2:00

Well , just walk me through the typical day .

Speaker 2 2:03

We come in during the day and we look up our studies and then we go out and do our studies , come back , put in our report and go out and do more studies . We'll do T's where we look at the heart on the inside by having a patient swallow our transducer , or sometimes we'll look at or fix patients valves by with a mitra valve clip , mitra clip or a TAVR .

Speaker 1 2:40

Which is , we've talked about those with Dr Kettlecamp , which is a transaortic valve replacement . So it's you don't have to have open heart surgery .

Speaker 2 2:50

Very true .

Speaker 1 2:52

Ultrasound continues to grow point of care ultrasounds , and a lot more than it was 10 , 15 years ago . What have you seen ? The biggest change in the last 15 years .

Speaker 2 3:05

I'd say the image quality is a big change , as well as the color quality .

Speaker 1 3:11

Really yes , Well , you know , it is the practice of medicine . You have to keep up on your skills . What sort of ongoing education does a cardiac stenographer do , so we have to get 30 CMEs every three years .

Speaker 2 3:26

We read articles through the American Society of Echocardiography or go to different meetings and stuff like that to keep up on our growing organization .

Speaker 1 3:41

Well , I can definitely attest to the quality of the study is the skill of the sonographer .

Speaker 2 3:51

As well as the machines . Yes , yeah .

Speaker 1 3:52

I mean , but you and your team , you do a great job . You know I read echoes . Before I came here to see your app I would often read my own or go up and at least look at them and I just phenomenal quality and that's important , because putting a patient through a study , that's not a benefit , you know , that's just not . Why did you choose this ? What got you interested in it ?

Speaker 2 4:14

I actually had heart surgery at the age of four .

Speaker 1 4:17

Oh man .

Speaker 2 4:17

And then my mother also did ultrasound . She just didn't do hearts .

Speaker 1 4:21

Oh , so she did regular ultrasound Correct and so you had the heart surgery . So that made you kind of think about cardiac sonographer .

Speaker 2 4:29

That is correct . I was born with actually an ASD or an intraceptal defect .

Speaker 1 4:33

Oh , wow , I didn't know that about you . That's very interesting . You know , everybody has something they like most about their job . I said the other day on it , talking to someone they were asking me about , kind of I said you know , the thing I love the most about my job is it's no effort to get along and to like the people I work with . I walk in the building every day and I'm like this is awesome . What do you like about your job ? What's the thing you love the most about it ?

Speaker 2 5:01

I love the people I work with , as well as the cardiologists . I have to give a big shout out to the cardiologists I work with . I mean they are great at teaching us about the all the different things that change in our work environment .

Speaker 1 5:16

Well and you play , you know key role we should let it be known . You participate in emergent situations too . When they need it , an ultrasound completed at the bedside . We've been in many of those cases together .

Speaker 2 5:30

Absolutely .

Speaker 1 5:31

For perhaps a cardiac sonographer that's listening to this podcast , or someone considering becoming a cardiac sonographer tell why St Luke's .

Speaker 2 5:42

It is a great place to work . Like I said , I've been here 17 years . They have great benefits and , like I said , the cardiologists are great to work with and they're great at teaching us everything we need to know . And you know it's I wouldn't have left . If I would have left , had it and not been such a great organization .

Speaker 1 6:00

Yeah , I've said that I just like the people I work with . You know just period , 100% agree . Yeah , it's effortless . I mean I show up every day and I don't have to put any effort into it , to just enjoy the people I'm around . And everybody's smiling For the most part .

Speaker 2 6:16

Yes .

Speaker 1 6:17

Nigel , thank you for joining me and sharing about a day in the life of a cardiac sonographer . Once again , this was Nigel Sifter , cardiac sonographer with St Luke's Hospital . If you're interested in a career in cardiac sonography or any other role at St Luke's , visit unipointorg backslash careers . Thank you for listening to Live Well Talk On . If you enjoyed this episode , don't forget to subscribe . And if you want to spread the word , please give us a five star review and tell your family , friends , neighbors , strangers about our podcast . We're available on Apple Podcasts , spotify , pandora or wherever you get your podcast . And until next time , be well .