Meet Vivian Nguyen, RCIS
Vivian Nguyen is a registered cardiovascular invasive specialist (RCIS) at Penn Heart and Vascular Center at Chester County Hospital. In this Q&A, she shares her background and what inspired her to choose a career in health care.
Q: What is your background and how long have you been at Chester County Hospital?
A: I started my career at Chester County Hospital as a cardiac catheterization technologist in May of 1991.
Dr. Timothy Boyek, currently the Medical Director of the Cardiac Diagnostic Interventional Catheterization Laboratories, recruited me from Bryn Mawr Hospital because Chester County Hospital was starting a diagnostic catheterization laboratory. Once I joined the team, there was additional demand in the echo/peripheral lab so I became retrained as a technologist in this area. In 2001, the hospital began performing interventional procedures and within a few years of that,
Dr. Richard Hui joined the medical staff and began to perform cardiac ablations and implantations. The growth of this area inspired me to become cross trained in the field of electrophysiology. We have started performing more complex procedures since
Dr. Kurt Schillinger joined the team 4 years ago, and with the addition of
Dr. Amanulla Khaji, we are busier than ever.
Q: What inspired you to choose your career and work in health care?
A: A really kind nurse from high school inspired me to go into nursing. From there, I went to Gwynedd Mercy College initially to become a nursing student but the program was full. My school counselor approached me to see if I was interested in taking a cardiopulmonary technology course since there was an opening. I began taking the course and changed my major from there.
Q: What do you love most about your job?
A: I love waking up every morning – even at 5:30 AM – because I have a great working relationship with our physicians and co-workers. The field of electrophysiology is complex and challenging, which keeps it interesting and exciting.
Q: What do you consider to be a game changer with Chester County Hospital's expansion?
A: The new electrophysiology lab. Currently, we are sharing a lab with the peripheral and catheterization teams. With the new platform, we will have our own dedicated electrophysiology lab where we can leave all of our equipment as is and perform cases any time our physicians are available, which will help with the flow of our procedures.
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