SJVC Bakersfield Announces New Respiratory Therapy Simulation Lab

If you are looking for a great job in healthcare, and want to make a difference with your career, then respiratory therapy may be the perfect career path for you. Across the country, the number of respiratory therapist (RT) positions is expected to increase between 2019 and 2029 — much faster than the average for all occupations, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Yet with a focus on educational effectiveness and employment outcomes, it is important for career-focused colleges to continue developing quality respiratory care programs. That is why SJVC Bakersfield decided to build a new respiratory therapy simulation lab to enhance students’ learning. Investing time, energy, and money on the latest technology will strengthen the structure of a Respiratory Therapy program and help to improve the quality of an education.

Campus President at SJVC Rancho Cordova, Jeff Rutherford, MEd, RRT, RCP, helped design the new simulation lab with the support of experienced faculty and staff in Bakersfield. Afterall, the Respiratory Therapy program at SJVC Rancho Cordova received the Distinguished RRT Credentialing Success Award from the Commission on Accreditation for Respiratory Care (CoARC) for the past five years.

“The new adult, and advanced pediatric and infant high-fidelity simulators, will bring a significantly substantial improvement to the simulation capabilities of the Bakersfield RT program,” said Rutherford. “In addition to the new space, the advanced animatronics and ventilatory capabilities of these simulators are hands-down the closest thing to working with a real human being, yet still not real allowing the practitioner to make those learning mistakes in a safe environment,” added Rutherford. “This benefits our community by providing our hospitals with well-honed practitioners that have been repeatedly and thoroughly tested in a simulation environment.”

With the new simulators and additional equipment, the Respiratory Therapy program at SJVC Bakersfield will be in an even better position to serve students and benefit the greater community by providing a hands-on education with the latest advancements in healthcare technology.

Respiratory therapists must work within a broad scope of practice, so they naturally benefit from working with state-of-the-art technology. Daily responsibilities include various respiratory care modalities in the treatment of pulmonary diseases and advanced critical care procedures. A respiratory therapist must also be competent in the skillful use of advanced diagnostic tools to accurately diagnose the severity of respiratory dysfunction in neonatal, pediatric, adult, and geriatric patients.

SJVC Respiratory Therapy programs at the Bakersfield, Ontario, Temecula and Rancho Cordova campuses have all received the award as a recognition of the program’s success in inspiring its graduates to achieve their highest educational and professional aspirations. The award is presented as part of the CoARC’s continued efforts to value the RRT credential as a standard of professional achievement. With a focus on program effectiveness, the CoARC Board used objective criteria to evaluate colleges across the country based on key accreditation metrics documented in the Annual Report of Current Status.

Learn more about SJVC Bakersfield and SJVC’s Respiratory Therapy program.

Visit our consumer information page for important information on program outcomes.