What I meant by running IVs...
- Running fluids through giving sets
- Making up (under supervision) IV antibiotics
- Stopping / recording finishing time / taking down sets and disposal (with permission, dependant on nurse and placement area)
- Connecting and starting (under some supervision)
- Disconnecting fluids (not drugs / syringe drivers) so patient can go to bathroom
- Silencing Baxter pumps and correcting blockages
- Removal / disconnection / disposal (without permission because the fluids are finished)
- The prep of the next bag (without prompting)
Right I'm off for a nap..... I got 1 hour of sleep last night. I do have something to post later too honest!
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7 comments:
Despite my horrible experience on a general ward, I do sometimes still wish I'd done adult nursing. You know where you are with practical skills; you either do them right or wrong. Mental health is a lot more wooly...the thing that worked on the last suicidal patient may just push this one over the edge. Am not saying adult is easier (too busy and too much life or death responsibility!) but some bits are more straightforward. Sorry, have completely highjacked your post!...that IV thing sounds like something that should be covered in your basic training I would have thought? Seems like an essential nursing skill to me...
IVs are basic skills. We learn them in 2nd year but it depends on the placement to what you get to do with them.
I've had these 'your job' / 'my job' debates before. In fact had a deputy sister laugh at my ambitions of working in ITU by saying 'oh, we could all do one-to-one nursing. It's all sitting on your backside'. I'd love to see her work in the ITU for just one day. I think all jobs work out equal in the end... well I hope so.
Hi, thanks for clarifying!
I am still surprised at the scope of what you seem to be allowed to do!
We are allowed (in the final year) to:
- Make up IV ABX (with supervision).
- Run them through the sets (prime them etc).
- Stop fluids (with permission).
- Connect fluids and syringe drivers to pumps- not cannulas (with supervision).
- Silence pumps.
We are NOT allowed to:
- Connect anything to a venflon.
- Disconnect any fluids/cap venflons.
- Stop fluids/pumps without supervision.
- correct blockages.
- Change Machine settings.
Are you allowed to witness and sign for CDs Wardbunny?
Cellar- it is actually a fairly advanced skill. IV management, although vital can be quite complicated, especially when you get onto syringe drivers and various types of meds that go through the different giving sets.
That is why i would consider it not to be a "basic" skill. We all must know how to do it, but I think quite rightly, we should not be allowed to do it unsupervised.
If you give someone the wrong pill, it'll take a while to metabolise and you have time to sort it out. If you give someone somthing IV, its done- no turning back!
Yes (in some places, it's not standard). I have signed for CDs both to be given to patients and receiving the orders. On a similar vein (sorry no pun intended) I've also been the second signature on blood transfusions (only once mind, they can be very uppity about that, but they are happy to let me do all the obs for the next 4 hours every 10 mins!).
Christ! I would never sign for bloods! Yikes!
Does what I do, and what you do seem to make sense there? Is it basucally the same?
ps. I've added you as a reader...
Meh once all the numbers / patient details / blood types are checked there shouldn't be a problem.
They are about the same. Sometimes I get away with more, not where I am now but where I was in the past.
p.s. thanks!
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