How to become Orderlie in 2024

Orderlie Transport patients to areas such as operating rooms or x-ray rooms using wheelchairs, stretchers, or moveable beds. May maintain stocks of supplies or clean and transport equipment. Psychiatric orderlies are included in Psychiatric Aides.

Orderlie is Also Know as

In different settings, Orderlie is titled as

  • Attendant
  • Operating Room Assistant
  • Orderly
  • Patient Care Assistant (PCA)
  • Patient Care Technician (PCT)
  • Patient Escort
  • Patient Transporter
  • Radiology Transporter
  • Transporter

Education and Training of Orderlie

Orderlie is categorized in Job Zone Two: Some Preparation Needed

Experience Required for Orderlie

Some previous work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is usually needed. For example, a teller would benefit from experience working directly with the public.

Education Required for Orderlie

These occupations usually require a high school diploma.

Degrees Related to Orderlie

Training Required for Orderlie

Employees in these occupations need anywhere from a few months to one year of working with experienced employees. A recognized apprenticeship program may be associated with these occupations.

Related Ocuupations

Some Ocuupations related to Orderlie in different industries are

What Do Orderlie do?

  • Answer patient call signals, signal lights, bells, or intercom systems to determine patients' needs.
  • Carry messages or documents between departments.
  • Change soiled linens, such as bed linens, drapes, or cubicle curtains.
  • Clean and sanitize patient rooms, bathrooms, examination rooms, or other patient areas.
  • Clean equipment, such as wheelchairs, hospital beds, or portable medical equipment, documenting needed repairs or maintenance.
  • Collect and transport infectious or hazardous waste in closed containers for sterilization or disposal, in accordance with applicable law, standards, or policies.
  • Collect soiled linen or trash.
  • Disinfect or sterilize equipment or supplies, using germicides or sterilizing equipment.
  • Lift or assist others to lift patients to move them on or off beds, examination tables, surgical tables, or stretchers.
  • Position or hold patients in position for surgical preparation.
  • Respond to emergency situations, such as emergency medical calls, security calls, or fire alarms.
  • Restrain patients to prevent violence or injury or to assist physicians or nurses to administer treatments.
  • Serve or collect food trays.
  • Stock or issue medical supplies, such as dressing packs or treatment trays.
  • Stock utility rooms, nonmedical storage rooms, or cleaning carts with supplies.
  • Supply, collect, or empty bedpans.
  • Transport bodies to the morgue.
  • Transport patients to treatment units, testing units, operating rooms, or other areas, using wheelchairs, stretchers, or moveable beds.
  • Transport portable medical equipment or medical supplies between rooms or departments.
  • Transport specimens, laboratory items, or pharmacy items, ensuring proper documentation and delivery to authorized personnel.
  • Turn or reposition bedridden patients, alone or with assistance, to prevent bedsores.
  • Provide physical support to patients to assist them to perform daily living activities, such as getting out of bed, bathing, dressing, using the toilet, standing, walking, or exercising.
  • Separate collected materials for disposal, recycling, or reuse, in accordance with environmental policies.
  • Take and record vital signs, such as temperature, blood pressure, pulse rate, or respiration rate, as directed by medical or nursing staff.

Qualities of Good Orderlie

  • Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
  • Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
  • Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
  • Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
  • Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
  • Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
  • Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
  • Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
  • Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
  • Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
  • Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
  • Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
  • Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
  • Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
  • Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
  • Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
  • Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
  • Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
  • Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
  • Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
  • Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
  • Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
  • Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
  • Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
  • Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
  • Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
  • Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
  • Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
  • Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
  • Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
  • Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
  • Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
  • Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
  • Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
  • Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
  • Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
  • Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
  • Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
  • Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
  • Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
  • Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
  • Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
  • Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
  • Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
  • Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
  • Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
  • Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
  • Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
  • Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
  • Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
  • Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
  • Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.

Tools Used by Orderlie

  • Adjustable hospital beds
  • Automated blood pressure cuffs
  • Automated external defibrillators AED
  • Desktop computers
  • Electronic patient thermometers
  • Hydraulic patient lifts
  • Laptop computers
  • Manual blood pressure equipment
  • Mechanical stethoscopes
  • Medical examination protective gloves
  • Medical gurneys
  • Medical scales
  • Multi-line telephone systems
  • Oxygen tanks
  • Oxygen tents
  • Oxygen therapy equipment
  • Patient bed scales
  • Patient limb restraints
  • Patient transfer boards
  • Patient transport wheelchairs
  • Personal computers
  • Portable x ray machines
  • Protective patient restraints
  • Safety razors
  • Shower chairs
  • Specimen collection containers
  • Therapeutic cold packs
  • Therapeutic hot packs

Technology Skills required for Orderlie

  • Electronic medical record EMR software
  • GE Healthcare Centricity EMR
  • Medical record charting software
  • Microsoft Excel
  • Microsoft Office software
  • Microsoft Outlook
  • Microsoft Windows