#426: The RAAS Pathway: A Key Concept in Nursing

Straight A Nursing: Study for nursing school exams & NCLEX

Straight A Nursing

Education, Medicine, Health & Fitness

4.6 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 31 July 2025

⏱️ 21 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed trying to piece together how blood pressure, fluid balance, and heart failure meds all connect, this episode is for you. In this lesson, we’re diving into the RAAS pathway, also known as the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system, and how this one system plays a major role in so many things you’ll encounter in nursing school and beyond. You’ll learn how RAAS helps regulate systemic vascular resistance and fluid volume, which ultimately impact cardiac output and blood pressure. I’ll walk you through the three main components—renin, angiotensin, and aldosterone—and show you exactly how they interact to keep the body in balance. We’ll also cover the medications that disrupt this pathway, including ACE inhibitors, ARBs, and aldosterone receptor blockers. These are foundational drugs used to treat hypertension and heart failure, and understanding the pathway gives you a deeper understanding of why and how they work. Plus, we touch on the role of pharmacologic angiotensin II in hypotension and septic shock. This episode highlights how mastering one system—just one!—can give you a big-picture view of multiple conditions and treatments. It’s a perfect example of what I teach in my free class, How to Thrive in Nursing School Without It Taking Over Your Life. And if you’re ready to keep building that strong foundation, I’ll also tell you how to join me inside Crucial Concepts Bootcamp. Ready to make the RAAS system finally click? Let’s do it! ___________________ Full Transcript - Read the article and view references FREE CLASS - If all you've heard are nursing school horror stories, then you need this class! Join me in this on-demand session where I dispel all those nursing school myths and show you that YES...you can thrive in nursing school without it taking over your life! Crucial Concepts Bootcamp - Start nursing school ahead of the game, or reset after a difficult first semester with my nursing school prep course, Crucial Concepts Bootcamp. Learn key foundation concepts, organization and time management, dosage calculations, and so much more. Straight A Nursing App - Study on-the-go with the Straight A Nursing app! Review more than 5,000 flashcards covering a wide range of subjects including Fundamentals, Pediatrics, Med Surg, Mental Health, Maternal Newborn, and more! Available for free in the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. Pharmacology Success Pack - Want to get a head start on pharmacology? Download the FREE Pharmacology Success Pack. Nursing School Thrive Guide - Get the book that many nursing students consider the ultimate survival guide for nursing school! Available in paperback, Kindle and audio formats. 💕Did you love this episode? Please take a moment to follow or subscribe to the show so you never miss an episode! ___________________ The information, including but not limited to, audio, video, text, and graphics contained on this podcast are for educational purposes only. No content on this podcast is intended to guide nursing practice and does not supersede any individual healthcare provider's scope of practice or any nursing school curriculum. Additionally, no content on this podcast is intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Straight A Nursing is a proud member of the Airwave Media Network. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	If you're a nursing student or a working busy nurse, I don't have to tell you how hard it is to just keep up with life, let alone keep your house clean between long shifts, clinical, studying, and trying to rest when you can.
0:14.8	Cleaning baseboards and scrubbing the oven, just don't make that list.
0:19.7	That's why I'm so excited about my first cleaning with HomeGlo.
0:23.2	I booked it online in just a few minutes and they're handling that deep stuff that I never get
0:28.4	around to, the baseboards, the oven, the cabinets, and even the windows. Yes, please. HomeGlo
0:35.5	is a top rated home service platform that connects you with trusted background-checked
0:40.3	cleaners in your area.
0:42.1	You can see photos, read reviews, and choose someone who feels like the right fit.
0:46.0	And the best part, 100% of the cleaning fee and tips go straight to your cleaner, so you
0:52.1	are supporting someone local.
0:53.9	They also offer a forever
0:55.5	clean membership that saves you $30 an hour on every cleaning. I'm talking unlimited
1:01.4	cleanings starting at just $19 an hour and backed by HomaGlo's happiness guarantee. So if your home
1:08.5	could use some love and if you need one less thing on your
1:12.1	to-do list, check out HomeAglow. Head to homeaglow.com slash nurse mo to get your first three
1:18.6	hours of cleaning for just $19. That's H-O-M-E-A-G-L-O-W.com slash nurse Moe. This episode is sponsored by HomeGlow.
1:29.6	Hello, hello, I'm Nurse Mo, and this is the straight- is the Straight A Nursing podcast where I teach nursing concepts
1:47.1	and share tips on how to thrive in school and at the bedside.
1:51.8	Today we're going to be talking about a foundation concept that once you know this concept,
1:58.7	it actually helps you understand quite a few other really important
2:03.8	concepts for nursing. So before we jump into that, let's take a quick minute for our shout-out,
2:09.9	which goes out to Georgia, who says, the scariest thing for me in nursing school was by far
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in 21 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Straight A Nursing, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Straight A Nursing and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.