Phlebotomists Are More Than Just the One Holding the Needle

When a patient goes to one of Intermountain Health’s clinics for a blood draw, they spend an average of seven minutes with the phlebotomist, hardly enough time to understand the scope and importance of this step in the medical process. It is brief enough that many don’t think much about the encounter, but the phlebotomist is so much more than just the person on the other side of the needle.

After more than twenty years with Intermountain Health as a phlebotomist—and more recently as the phlebotomy supervisor for Intermountain St. George Regional Hospital—Brandon Robertson bristles whenever he hears one of his technicians describe themselves as “just a phlebotomist.”

“I’m quick to tell them, you’re not ‘just’ anything. You are a vital member of this patient’s care team,” Robertson said. “It’s such a valuable role.”

That role includes a combination of technical and interpersonal skills, the latter being the most important, in Robertson’s experience.

“We used to look for people during the hiring process who had taken a phlebotomy course and were skilled in that area,” Robertson said. “Now we offer our own training in the practical skills, and we look for candidates who are able to make a human connection with patients.”

The idea is that Intermountain Health’s phlebotomy training can teach the logistics of drawing blood, but the innate sense a person has for relating to others is something more difficult to acquire.

“It’s our job to make patients feel at ease, to make a connection with them, and do it over and over again,” Robertson said.

That doesn’t mean the practical skills are unimportant, however. As anyone who has had a blood draw can attest, some phlebotomists can make the experience much more pain-free than others. Just as importantly, the phlebotomist is the one who handles the information that will guide clinicians in determining how best to care for a patient.

“If we’re not there to collect a good blood sample to send to the scientists, the physicians can’t make valuable decisions for a person’s care,” Robertson said.

From the standpoint of someone interested in the medical field, Robertson said phlebotomy is a great way to gain experience across a wide range of departments, experience that may shape the direction a person chooses to take in their career.

“We touch every single department in this hospital, from radiology to the cath lab to surgical, you name it,” Robertson said. “It’s such a great window for our caregivers to see into fields they may not have known were there.”

Robertson said roughly 80 percent of those who come into the phlebotomy program use it as a means of launching their careers as caregivers in other fields. However, many, like himself, love what they do and stay with phlebotomy their entire careers.

“It’s really rewarding to touch so many lives in a single day,” Robertson said. “We are often with people during their highest and lowest times, depending on their medical diagnosis. After the physician tells them they have concerns and need to run tests, we are the ones in the room with the patient.”

And that, Robertson said, is where the ability to make a human connection really makes a difference.