Do I Really Need an EKG Course to Work on a Telemetry Unit?

Pretty much the only rhythm you know is normal sinus rhythm, and the only facts you know about telemetry are that a very fast or slow heart rate can be bad.  You’ve heard of atrial fibrillation but could you point it out on a monitor if you saw it?  What about ventricular tachycardia- would you know it if you saw it on the screen and would you know what to do about it?  And forget about junctional rhythms, heart blocks, and bundle branch blocks… what are those?  You are indeed a newbie to the world of cardiac telemetry and EKG.

That’s why you should to take an EKG course.  Whether online or in person, an EKG course is your best bet in getting the knowledge and competence you need to care for your telemetry patient and safely work on a telemetry unit.  

Most EKG courses start with reviewing cardiac anatomy and physiology and the cardiac conduction system.  This helps by giving you a picture and a basis for everything you will be learning, as most EKG courses are broken down into categories of where the cardiac electrical impulse originates from, i.e. sinus, atrial, junctional, etc.  

Another aspect of EKG education is learning what all those lines and squiggles on the monitor stand for and what they are called.  It shows you which part of the heart coordinates with which wave on the screen and what that part is doing at the time of that wave, i.e. the big up and down wave is the QRS complex- it represents the electrical impulse moving through the ventricles.  Then we learn how to measure each of these.  Each wave or line on the screen determines a certain length of time.  Time is important because it shows how quickly or slowly an impulse is moving through the heart.  A slower impulse may mean there’s an issue in the conduction system somewhere.

Once all the labeling and measuring is learned, most EKG courses then break it down into categories of where the electrical impulse originates from.  There are usually 5 categories here: sinus, atrial, junctional, ventricular, and the heart blocks.  Sometimes a 6^th category is paced rhythms.  Each category has several rhythms within it that need to be learned and each rhythm has its own set of rules regarding the wave lengths, time, etc.  Once these rules are learned, reading EKG’s and telemetry gets A LOT easier.

Some EKG courses also have extras like a review of cardiac medications and their indications regarding cardiac arrhythmia or a clinical perspective on each rhythm regarding the causes, treatments, and clinical presentation.  A good EKG course will also give you lots of rhythm strips to practice measuring and figuring out what each rhythm is.  It’s not enough just to just practice at work, as most of the rhythm strips you will encounter there will be a form of sinus rhythm with the occasional atrial fibrillation.

Finally, when choosing an EKG course, make sure it offers you everything you think you will need to feel comfortable and confident caring for your cardiac patient.