-: My name is Claire Parta.
I am a certified surgical technologist
and I work at Waukesha Memorial Hospital
for the pro-healthcare system.
A surgical technologist is responsible
for setting up a room for, let's say,
if you're getting a knee, for example.
I'm in there before the surgeon
and everybody else, I'm checking my pans,
I'm setting up the whole case
and then during the case, I help the doc
and assist him or her with instruments, et cetera.
I'm also responsible for making sure
everybody keeps up with their sterile technique,
which is not touching things they're not supposed to,
you know, if anything falls on the floor,
obviously you're not picking it up.
But you know, all those little nuances.
You can reach up and touch the light
and not quite hit the side of your head.
All right, you gotta go re-scrub and do everything.
So we have a computerized system
where everybody's name, doc, who's in the room,
patient name, et cetera, is all up on the board
and you come in and you see what,
you know, your workflow is for the day.
It gets a little,
some getting used to,
just because the shift I work,
I don't start right away in the morning with everybody.
I'm kind of like a mid shift.
So a lot of times I come in,
give a few lunches or breaks,
and I'm not really in a case that's mine,
until one or two o'clock.
I work two eight-hour shifts,
two ten-hour shifts and every day,
every week I get one day off.
That just works with my hospital and my work plan.
Some people do three twelves, some people do four tens.
It's just kind of,
a conversation that you have during the hiring process.
There are some days where my whole 10-hour shift,
I'm in a back fusion.
I love those cases.
One case all day long.
It's a lot of standing
and it's a lot of technical work but,
they're my favorite case
so it's not so boring and tedious.
Then there's days where I'm running around
and doing like, small hour cases.
So then I do 10 cases in a day for my 10 hour shift.
Which one is more stressful or which one is hard?
They both have their challenges.