[moonshadeau]

I am curious as to what is the practice at other hospitals regarding IV tubing labeling of the drug in the line. Our critical care areas label the name of the drug in the tubing at the distal end.

Do you practice this as well? Do you have a policy in place or know of reference material that supports this practice? Other thoughts?

Thanks,

Moonshadeau

[RNperdiem]

Yes.
When there are multiple drugs infusing, it is important to know exactly what is going where.
I label lines at the distal end. I always like to know where the maintenence infusion port is in case I need to push some emergency drugs.

[janfrn]

I don't know that we have a policy, but we definitely have a standard practice. We label the tubing at the distal end (I like to wrap it around the hard part where the tubing connects to the Luer lock... it stays there better) and we also label the pump with whatever it's infusing. We use orange med tickets so we can see from the foot of the bed what is running and what the concentration is.

[BlueEyedRN]

Not a policy, but definitely important. If I come in to a big tangle of IV tubing and pumps, the first thing I do is go through and label everything, make sure everything is compatible, etc. It would be horrible to push 10 mls of a med through what I thought was NS, but turns out to be an insulin drip or to be inlined into an insulin drip further down. I don't understand how people can do without labels. I usually stick the labels at the port rather than the distal end. And then I make a chart of what is going in where to tape at the nurses station so I can quickly figure out where to add something or if I need to start a new IV.

[diveRN]

Our pumps have electronic labels for the Guardrails drugs so it makes it easier to look at when you have 8 channels infusing something...

We also label at the pt.

[moonshadeau]

Thanks to all. There has been much discussion at our hospital that this practice will no longer be allowed. There is fear that by labeling lines, nurses will not take the time to trace their lines back. I believe that labeling lines is a safety issue in the critical care setting, but it has been a really tough sell.

[Spatialized]

I'm not a critical care nurse (PCU/Step-down) but if I have multiple lines running I too label lines and pumps. It's not policy or protocol, but to me it just makes sense and that's only with 2, maybe 3 lines...I wold think it wold be more followed for more.

[janfrn]

When I've got 20+ infusions going you can bet I'm labeling. Standard practice or not. We might have epi, norepi, vaso, nitroprusside, furosemide, amiodarone, heparin, insulin, TPN, tacrolimus, ganciclovir, morphine, midazolam, albumin and an assortment of intermittent meds all going at the same time on a single patient. Which ones am I likely to want to push? Maybe the albumin...

[Bronx1560]

It's not a policy but it's just a common nursing courtesy.
It's the best thing to do when you have tons of meds tubes lines etc. My hearts, septic, & neuro pt's all get them labeled.

Pumps & lines are labeled. It just helps with idenification of meds & location of things.

[scarymary]

We label each infusion line with the drug label, and also a 'change date' label.