respiratory therapist

medical office assistant

summer intern

recruiter

medical administrative assistant

VitalAire

Delivered mostly oxygen tanks to seniors with respiratory problems
learned about compressed gas and cryogenic medical gas. 

Direct manager and coworkers were really great people to work with, dealing with the people at the head office, not so much. They seemed to be incredibly out of touch with the realities and daily ongoings of each branch, and kept expecting employees to squeeze more and more work into an already full-to-the-brim work day. Felt sometimes like you were doing the work of 2+ people.

The hardest part of the job was having having to hand deliver and return oxygen tanks to/from people living on the third floor of a walk-up apartment, every week, carting them down a sidewalk covered in snow in the winter. Also delivering to clients in more dangerous areas of the city where I didn't always feel the safest, but unfortunately that's where they had to live and it was my job to make deliveries to them. (Dodging uncapped, hypodermic needles in the snow was definitely not something I was aware of during the hiring process, so be please be aware that there are a range of clients from varying walks of life, living in varying areas of whatever city you'll be working in).

The most enjoyable part of the job was knowing you were making a difference in easing the suffering of some very sick people, sometimes children. Also getting to work with and learn about liquid nitrogen and liquid oxygen. Company leases new International trucks every few years, it was nice for once getting to drive a truck that had air conditioning in the summer.

Work/life balance is off at this company, as a driver you can expect to work every single stat holiday, so say goodbye to those family and friends you look forward to seeing a handful of times a year. Routes do not get switched up, so it's likely that someone with "the good/easy route" will stay on it until they're sick or take vacation. Work was extra monotonous in that every week will be relatively the same as the last one, this company could benefit from rotating routes but I understand the reasons that they did not do that.

One of the better jobs I have had in the transportation sector, but comes with it's own set of headaches like any driving job - which is exactly why drivers don't seem to stay at non-unionized driving jobs for a very long time.

Typical day at work started with inspecting oxygen tanks, checking for annual dates and condition of tanks. Venting any excess oxygen out of tank.  Roughly 2 people on team would inspect 1300 tanks a day. And then loading and unloading oxygen tanks from a racking system when the tanks were filled. 

Unloading delivery trucks into warehouse, sending material out. 
This same process continued roughly 15 times every shift. So we were basically running a repetitive system over and over with little to no variability. Plenty of paperwork to fill out as you are under the eye of health Canada, so you must dot every "I" and cross every "T" on your paperwork or there are consequences. 

You are working in a small team environment with roughly 5 other people. And when one person is on vacation your daily quota is the same as when all 5 people were there. And if someone is on vacation and someone else is sick your daily quota is the same as if all 5 people were there because your providing healthcare products that must be delivered. 

Your probably lifting 1000's of pounds of material every shift and doing allot of repetitive lifting. So if your physically strong and like repetitive tasks and can handle working with the same people in the same location every day then go for it. 

Another difficult part of the job was when someone else quits you could/ will be expected to cover for  that person and do most of their work for months at a time, until they hire a replacement. Consistent year round work due to medical needs provided good job security.  

Good luck getting a raise, they will give out 1% - 3% no matter how hard you worked or lack there of.

Best perk about this job was the salary, benefits & hours- but to me it wasn't worth staying in the toxic environment.

Completely disappointed in how this business is being managed. 

Be prepared for lack of orientation and training even when requested (you'll be shadowing your coworkers busy schedule for two weeks),  favouritism is real, unorganized business, no structure and poor managment, high stress levels daily, fear of losing job, huge turn over rate of employees, if managment and certain co workers dislike you -you'll be let go immediately, lonely lunch room, hardly ever take your unpaid 30 min lunch break (unless you force yourself too), lack of staff which means you'll be covering more then 1 job duty, and I had to educate myself about CPAP and masks- even requested more then once to meet with reps to review supplies.
I am appalled by the way this business is being managed- I've never been treated so poorly in my healthcare career. 
Vital Aire is very business and sales oriented- no such thing as patient center care.
Do your research on vital aire, dont quit the job you currently have for this buisness and read through the comments before you make you decision. 
As stated through these comment Vital Aire job culture "extremely low morale" & I agree.

Hope what happened to me, doesn't happen to you.

The worst run company to ever work for. You get hired over the phone by someone in HR down east (never get a real interview), then you are hired onto a company that doesn’t care about your life outside of work. Horrible-long hours, awful vacation (2 weeks after slaving for over 40 hours a week, for 52 weeks straight.), terrible supervisor/ manager balance. Your direct supervisor “runs” the office far too chill (let’s people get away with being late or taking mondays off all the time), and has obvious “favorites”, and was a downright pleasure to work for... 
But your manager runs it so strictly, that when you find out that someone may be getting fired, bring it up to your supervisor, who then tells your manager and fired you. (For no good reason). Oh, and doesn’t have any actual business degrees I may add. 
The hours are terrible, because you are expected to work overtime. And go on call once a month with little training for emergencies. I was a driver I never should have been on call anyways. 
Plus you work with a laughable amount of co-workers (6) and are expected to do the job of 2 people anywhere else. All while making far less than your adverceries. 
In conclusion, this company will go under with the current management. Please fix this, or your company will go under. 
If I had some advice for this company, I would say to put your employees before your corporate greed, and realize when you constantly fire people for no reason, your team morale will stay low.

Overall the company appears to make initiatives and have all the theories to improve the organization and it’s employees but that always falls flat. Despite countless meeting and false initiatives. 
Management do not know how to implement their ideas- they are too concerned with office politics and who gets to be the teachers pet. Staff in my department are not adequately trained - they hire staff with the same aggressive attitudes as they have who either have poor communication skills, social skills or common sense and could care less to properly train anyone because the management team instill their employees with the passion to climb the ladder by throwing everyone else off.So long as they can push some buttons and follow orders is all that matters. Gossip seems to be more important than the progression of staff and the company. Threats are often used as initiatives to do more work- even though the staff are over worked because targets can’t be met due to the increasingly high turn over rate and overall poor results from the company. 

All in all poorly organized work place that will not get anywhere unless the current supervisory  staff are stripped and rehired.

A typical day at work is answering problem calls and complaints from customers. Also, fixing mistakes done by other people in the department who were not properly trained or lazy.
What I have learned is that it does not matter how well you do your job, this company has no recognition for their good employees and they spend more time "babying" the ones that do poor work. 
Management is unfair and they have a tendency to pile on the work on employees who seem to do well because they don't trust the ones that do less well to get the job done efficiently. This could be corrected by proper training but the employees are trained by other employees and not by the supervisor or manager. In fact, supervisor is also new and comes from the outside not knowing anything about the company. Poor judgement from the company. 
I have met some great co-workers, but it is best too keep to yourself as a lot of them will be nice to your face and then throw you under the bus to get ahead. 
The hardest part of the job is feeling like you are doing everything and nobody else is pulling their weight. And when you are feeling overworked and look for help, you get no support from your superiors or colleagues.

On a typical day, a customer service representative could take anywhere from 50 to 100 calls in a very fast paced environment. There was direct contact with doctors, nurses, hospital discharge coordinators, nursing home staff and patients. Our calls could be new patient referrals, which were very time sensitive; placing live orders for supplies; general inquiries; delivery inquiries; making travel arrangements for the patients; scheduling appointments for patients; follow up and general office clerical work. There was on going product training.

Some of the things that I learned was extensive product and medical information. Using Scheduleview to book appointments. How to be compassionate towards people who were dealing with life and death matters.

The hardest part of the job was the lack of consistent communication regarding work procedures.

Fellow co-workers worked very well together as a team and were always ready to help out each other if the workload became too heavy.

The most enjoyable part was being able to help the patients.

Upper management does not understand branch operations and would rather place blame than actually determine the cause of branch issues.  Since 2011 there have been more than 10 staff members that have quit or been terminated and rarely do they replace those staff members.  They expect the remaining staff to pick up the slack and when it can't be done, they place blame on the unappreciated administrative staff rather than determine the actual reasons for the issues.  The regional director is unwilling to listen to branch issues and the branch managers will not support their staff and will throw them under the bus because they believe their job will be in jeopardy if they support their staff.  This has caused several administrative assistants to lose their jobs, even when they were doing a good job, because the regional director mistakenly placed blame on them, rather than listen to the actual reasons for the problems.

I notice that MANY people have the same complaint with this company; Management plays favourites. The second you voice your opinion or concerns or even struggles .. your out the door with no explanation. I spent 3 months at this company and never in my life have I been more stressed out while being trained. The person training me was constantly breathing down my neck and was told to NEVER hesitate to ask questions. Yet when I did ask questions my trainer was very noticeably annoyed and irritated and then would act all friendly to me when in front of the manager. 
Management clearly had their favourites and when I was asked to be brutally honest... It was only to give them more fuel to criticize me. Also, they will constantly tell you when your first learning the ropes, " don't worry , everything is fixable." But if you do make a mistake, you get repremanded.
Don't work here. It's a waste of time, energy and not worth the stress. Way too many office politics.

I would never recommend anyone work for this company in this role, not even to my worst enemy. There was low level bullying from management and even some staff,  micromanaging, management that is inept, out of touch with their staff, not good communicators and are there to make themselves look good only.  Putting patients first is a slogan only. Don't be fooled- they don't put their staff or patients first. It's about $ and keeping the unprofessional and inept amateur managers in their roles for as long as possible. There is a high turnover rate because of these reasons and also a low attendance rates. 
There is no chance of advancing with the company unless you want to relocate. The job itself was not difficult and speaking with patients was one of the plus of this job.  The company/team lack direction , common sense and managers who are there to suppor their team.  If you want to be treated with respect, know that your team and the company have your back, I strongly suggest you look elsewhere! 

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Respiratory therapist 1 salary reported	$45.32 per hour
Medical office assistant 1 salary reported	$22.50 per hour
Summer intern 1 salary reported	$19.00 per hour
Recruiter 1 salary reported	$62,500 per year
Medical administrative assistant 1 salary reported	$21.00 per hour

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