[suzanne4]

You did a wonderful job for what you had available at the time to you. And I am sure that many of us "older" posters here, remember being in similar situations at one time or another thru our careers and where we did not have what we needed.

Job well done, you deserve it.

[P_RN]

You have seen more in your 9 months that I ever have. To borrow from one of my favorite staff here you were a "joule" of a nurse to your patient. Congratulations on the great work.

[SusanKathleen]

Wow! I am in awe. Loved your story.

[BBFRN]

Originally Posted by Morettia2

Let's call it a truce. I am still learning about what to do in a mega code.

Morettia- you did a great job (big pat on the back for you). As an experienced nurse, I would be proud to work next to you any day.

[suzanne4]

Me too.

[Morettia2]

thanks everyone for your words! It means alot to me! Let's hope my next 3 days in a row I have no codes...I will take a RRT any day

[sirI]

Hope you have a great rest of the work week. But, I'm sure if you have something to come up, you can handle it.

Good job.

[nurseaboveboard]

Yes, I agree with most all of the responses here Morettia2. I think you did an absolutely amazing job, and I'd be proud to have you as a co-worker!

[NsgChica]

Wow! Jaw hits the floor!

[Morettia2]

so yet AGAIN tonight had another CODE BLUE right at shift change. I walked onto the floor hadn't even swiped my badge yet, back pack still on, car keys in hand. It was 1900. I looked at my assignment sheet and went to grab a piece of paper to write my pt. assignment, don't even have a pen in my hand yet, when I see one of the stretchers roll by with a pt. from the cath lab, ok, so one of the day shift nurses follows the pt. to the assigned room, to recieve the pt. untill we get report. I am looking at the pt. assignment when I hear the day shift nurse screaming..."call the doctor"..I asked what's wrong..she said "pt can't breathe, pt. muttered in spanish something about Penicillin" (pt. spoke little to no english)..I just dropped everything didn't even bother calling a RRT b/c I knew where this was headed, mind you that no one is really paying attention b/c they are all busy getting report, when I picked up the phone and immediatly called a code blue. It came on the over head paging system and everyone is like..huh?.."Code Blue Interventional Cardiology"...all the nurses looked at me and said that pt. just arrived from the cath lab, he's fine. I picked up the chart, which was still in a folder, "pt. s/p ICD insertion" and saw that they had given the pt. ANCEF in the cath. lab as I was running to the room, still with my coat and backpack on, the only things i could not drop. I asked the family, thank god they had been there, if the pt. was allergic to penicillin, they said pt. was severly allergic. Nothing on the chart about the pt. having a PCN allergy. I also see a small note ,that if you blinked you would miss it, that the pt. is a dialysis pt. I asked the family and they told me the pt. hadn't had dialysis in 2 days. I took a step back from the bed b/c of all the commotion just to assess if there were any IVF and realized the pt had a Vanco IVPB along with IVF. None of this was in the report that the cath lab had given the day shift nurses before the pt. arrived to the floor. I immeadtly stopped the IVF and the vanco gtt.
I myself am deadly allergic to penicillin so when the nurse had told me that the pt. muttered something in spanish about penicillin, I just knew to call a code b/c this was going no where good. There happened to be a tele resident on the floor at the time ,before the code team showed up. The resident goes to me, "what should I give the pt", while she is thumbing through her Tarascon pharm book..I looked at her and said "Epi, SQ or IM b/c the pt has poor venous access and solu-medrol IVP, but you HAVE to give the Epi first "..I also told her the pt. had not recieved dialysis in 2 days and had IVF running, that I immedatly stopped... she looked at me and said, "yea do what she just said" . As I am ripping open the epi and one of the other nurses was drawing up the solumedrol, THANK GOD the code team showed up. The cardiac fellow came running into the room, along with the anestiologist from the cath lab, and saw me ripping open the epi along with the other nurse drawing up the solumedrol and knew exactly what was happening to the pt. with little to no questions asked. Mind you before the code team showed up it was me, 2 other RNs, and the tele resident, who was clueless as for what do do. When the code team showed up it was Respiratory, Nursing Director for Night Shift, House MD, Code Team MD's, cardiac fellow, cath lab anestiologist, some random MED students that just stood there and did nothing. Pt was intubated immeadtly, pt. was foaming at the mouth. Suction.. TLC inserted after 3 attempts, which is good, considering it took 10 attempts the other night on another pt. that coded. Anyway, this all happened in about 30-45 min. Pt. ended up in the CCU at 2000...after the pt. was transfered, The cardiac fellow and I were documenting the code and going through the chart, which wasn't much. We called the cath lab and asked why was there nothing on the chart about the pt. having a severe PCN allergy, and the fact it was only documented once that the pt. recieves dialysis and why the pt.recieved quite a bit of IVF when the pt. hadn't been dialyzed pre-ICD implant. THIS WAS OUR ANSWER: