What a respiratory therapist really does
You keep people breathing, reading blood gases and tuning ventilators, then you are first through the door when someone stops breathing.
FieldHealth
Preparation (O*NET Job Zone)Medium preparation needed
What the work involves
What fills a typical week for respiratory therapists, built from O*NET occupation data.
- Walk a large assignment of patients across floors and the ICU giving breathing treatments and checking oxygen
- Run ventilator checks, read arterial blood gases and adjust settings within protocol and physician orders
- Call physicians with blood gas results and recommend changes
- Respond to rapid responses, codes and equipment alarms anywhere in the hospital
- Chart every treatment, setting and patient response
- Teach patients and families about inhalers, home oxygen and disease management
- Clean, test and troubleshoot respiratory equipment
What the days are like
What people in the job know
- You are on your feet and moving most of the shift, covering patients across the whole building. Spend time walking or running: 57% more than half the time, 31% continually; Spend time standing: 66% more than half the time (O*NET Work Context)
- You are trusted to make real calls. Protocols give RTs wide room to adjust therapy. Freedom to make decisions: 72% a lot of freedom; Task rank 10: Determine requirements for treatment compatible with physicians' orders, importance 91 (O*NET)
- Precision is non negotiable. A wrong ventilator number or a misread gas changes someone's breathing immediately. Importance of being exact or accurate: 85% extremely important (O*NET Work Context)
- Infection exposure and close contact are daily, so protective gear is routine. Exposed to disease or infections: 99% every day; Physical proximity: 99% very close; Wear specialized protective or safety equipment: 44% every day (O*NET Work Context)
- You are responsible for other people's safety, not just your patients, and you often lead in emergencies. Health and safety of other workers: 70% very high responsibility; Coordinate or lead others: 47% extremely important, 52% very important (O*NET Work Context)
How people get into it
An accredited respiratory therapy associate degree (99% of O*NET respondents say an associate degree is required), then the NBRC credentialing exams (the Therapist Multiple Choice exam for CRT, then the Clinical Simulation exam for RRT) and a state license, which nearly every state requires. Bachelor's programs are growing and some hospitals prefer them for ICU or leadership roles.
The Firstday trial, easy to hard
Three simulated tasks with AI coworkers who message you, react to your work and coach with questions. Nobody scores you.
What the trial can't show: This trial does not cover hands on skills: setting up and connecting a ventilator, suctioning, intubation, chest physiotherapy, drawing an arterial blood sample, doing CPR, or the physical pace of walking a whole hospital for 12 hours. It covers the reading, deciding, documenting and team communication parts. You act as a respiratory therapy student on clinical rotation with a licensed RT supervising every decision; patients and values are fictional.
Reading about it is one thing.
Find out how the work feels to you before you spend on a degree, course or job change. Your first trial is free.
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Job details on this page are built from O*NET OnLine, 29-1126.00. This page includes information from the O*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license. O*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA.