Phlebotomist Draw blood for tests, transfusions, donations, or research. May explain the procedure to patients and assist in the recovery of patients with adverse reactions.
Phlebotomist is Also Know as
In different settings, Phlebotomist is titled as
- Lab Liaison Technician
- Mobile Examiner
- Patient Service Technician (PST)
- Phlebotomist
- Phlebotomy Technician
- Registered Phlebotomist
Education and Training of Phlebotomist
Phlebotomist is categorized in Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed
Experience Required for Phlebotomist
Previous work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is required for these occupations. For example, an electrician must have completed three or four years of apprenticeship or several years of vocational training, and often must have passed a licensing exam, in order to perform the job.
Education Required for Phlebotomist
Most occupations in this zone require training in vocational schools, related on-the-job experience, or an associate's degree.
Degrees Related to Phlebotomist
- Bachelor in Phlebotomy Technician/Phlebotomist
- Associate Degree Courses in Phlebotomy Technician/Phlebotomist
- Masters Degree Courses in Phlebotomy Technician/Phlebotomist
Training Required for Phlebotomist
Employees in these occupations usually need one or two years of training involving both on-the-job experience and informal training with experienced workers. A recognized apprenticeship program may be associated with these occupations.
Related Ocuupations
Some Ocuupations related to Phlebotomist in different industries are
- Histotechnologists
- Medical and Clinical Laboratory Technicians
- Medical and Clinical Laboratory Technologists
- Cardiovascular Technologists and Technicians
- Histology Technicians
- Medical Assistants
- Neurodiagnostic Technologists
- Surgical Assistants
- Emergency Medical Technicians
- Surgical Technologists
- Diagnostic Medical Sonographers
- Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses
- Radiologic Technologists and Technicians
- Paramedics
- Emergency Medicine Physicians
- Nursing Assistants
- Medical Equipment Preparers
- Nurse Anesthetists
- Pharmacy Technicians
- Veterinary Technologists and Technicians
What Do Phlebotomist do?
- Collect fluid or tissue samples, using appropriate collection procedures.
- Dispose of blood or other biohazard fluids or tissue, in accordance with applicable laws, standards, or policies.
- Dispose of contaminated sharps, in accordance with applicable laws, standards, and policies.
- Document route of specimens from collection to laboratory analysis and diagnosis.
- Draw blood from arteries, using arterial collection techniques.
- Draw blood from capillaries by dermal puncture, such as heel or finger stick methods.
- Draw blood from veins by vacuum tube, syringe, or butterfly venipuncture methods.
- Explain fluid or tissue collection procedures to patients.
- Match laboratory requisition forms to specimen tubes.
- Organize or clean blood-drawing trays, ensuring that all instruments are sterile and all needles, syringes, or related items are of first-time use.
- Administer subcutaneous or intramuscular injects, in accordance with licensing restrictions.
- Calibrate or maintain machines, such as those used for plasma collection.
- Collect specimens at specific time intervals for tests, such as those assessing therapeutic drug levels.
- Conduct hemoglobin tests to ensure donor iron levels are normal.
- Conduct standards tests, such as blood alcohol, blood culture, oral glucose tolerance, glucose screening, blood smears, or peak and trough drug levels tests.
- Determine donor suitability, according to interview results, vital signs, and medical history.
- Enter patient, specimen, insurance, or billing information into computer.
- Monitor blood or plasma donors during and after procedures to ensure health, safety, and comfort.
- Perform saline flushes or dispense anticoagulant drugs, such as Heparin, through intravenous (IV) lines, in accordance with licensing restrictions and under the direction of a medical doctor.
- Process blood or other fluid samples for further analysis by other medical professionals.
- Provide sample analysis results to physicians to assist diagnosis.
- Serve refreshments to donors to ensure absorption of sugar into their systems.
- Train other medical personnel in phlebotomy or laboratory techniques.
- Transport specimens or fluid samples from collection sites to laboratories.
Qualities of Good Phlebotomist
- Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
- 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.
- 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.
- Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
- Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
- Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
- Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
- Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
- 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).
- Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
- 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.
- Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
- Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
- 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.
- Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
- 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.
- Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
- 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.
- Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
- Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
- Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
- 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).
- 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.
- 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.
- Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
- Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
- Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
- 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.
- Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
- Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
- Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
- Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
- Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
- Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
- Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
- 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.
- Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
- Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
- Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
- Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
- Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
- 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.
- 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.
- Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
- Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
- Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
- Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
- Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
- Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
Tools Used by Phlebotomist
- Aliquot tubes
- Barcode scanners
- Biohazard spill kits
- Blood collection syringes
- Blood culture bottles
- Blood culture incubators
- Blood drawing syringes
- Blood gas kits
- Blood glucose monitoring equipment
- Blood lancets
- Blood specimen refrigerators
- Capillary tubes
- Culture plates
- Digital timers
- Erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) pipettes
- Intravenous IV administration equipment
- Laboratory centrifuges
- Laptop computers
- Laser facsimile machines
- Medical face masks
- Microcapillary hematocrit tubes
- Microhematocrit tubes
- Mobile barcode printers
- Multi-sample blood collection needles
- Occult blood kits
- Personal computers
- Phlebotomy carts
- Phlebotomy chairs
- Phlebotomy practice arms
- Phlebotomy practice blocks
- Phlebotomy practice heels
- Phlebotomy transport bags
- Phlebotomy trays
- Protective aprons
- Safety needles
- Sharps disposal containers
- Specimen tube holders
- Sputum cups
- Sterile screw-cap glass tubes
- Sterile screw-cap plastic tubes
- Transfer pipettes
- Unopette equipment
- Urine analysis equipment
- Vein finding devices
- Venipuncture butterfly needles
- Venipuncture needle holders
- Venipuncture needles
- Venipuncture tourniquets
Technology Skills required for Phlebotomist
- Donor management system software
- Electronic medical record EMR software
- Iatric Systems MobiLab
- JavaScript
- Laboratory information system LIS
- Medical procedure coding software
- MEDITECH Blood Bank
- MEDITECH Laboratory and Microbiology
- MEDITECH software
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Office software
- Microsoft Outlook
- Microsoft Word
- Scheduling software