Post Anesthesia Care Unit Nursing

Post Anesthesia Care Unit nurses are certified in BLS (Basic Life Support, at the Provider Level), ACLS (Advanced Cardiac Life Support) and PALS (Pediatric Advanced Life Support). This area is a temporary holding space for post-surgical or post-procedure patients who have had anesthesia administered. The nurses in this area must carefully monitor patient's sedation levels. It is the nurse who wakes the patient up post surgery and administers pain medication as needed to maintain the patient's comfort level. It is vitally important that the nurse monitors the patient's respiratory and heart rates while administering pain medications. Within the first hour of the patient's arrival, the nurse may have to administer pain medication every few minutes until the patient is able to maintain a level of pain relief. The nurse's role in this patient's care is very short term. In most cases this area of nursing has the most desirable working hours of days, no weekends and no holidays.

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