Accidental Artery Stick Phlebotomy student

[Mary-V]

I am a phlebotomy student in clinical right now. I am concerned about an accidental artery stick. A man came in the PSC for blood work and I went through the speech about being a student and I asked him if it was okay to draw his blood. He said it was fine but that he needed to be laying down. We are connected to a doctors office so the other phlebotomist (my actual phlebotomist preceptor was at lunch) took him to one of the available rooms. She already selected the vein for me and it was the basilic vein. I began to draw like any other time but the angle was different and I accidentally hit the artery. I didn't realize it until I looked at how bright the blood was. I didn't say anything at the time because I didn't want to frighten an already sensitive patient. She checked to see if he had stopped bleeding and bandaged him up before she knew it was an artery after we all left the room I told her I think I hit an artery. She did not say anything to me and did not seem concerned. I'm running all the worse case scenarios in my head. I'm scared that he did not receive adequate enough pressure. Should I be concerned? I'm so worried about this I can't sleep. Please help!

[chillnurse, BSN, RN, NP]

your freaking out over nothing. They'll live, lol. 5 minutes pressure usually does the trick. remember this rule. There are only two places in the body people can bleed out without you knowing... the chest... and the abdomen... rule of thumb I use for my practice. There is no such thing as a hidden bleed in the radial or brach. artery.

[chillnurse, BSN, RN, NP]

Other rule of thumb= Unless somebody is ridiculously coumadin toxic or has a serious clotting factor disorder, you basically need to stab them about 500 times in the arm to make them bleed to death. lol

[applewhitern, BSN, RN]

I once had a patient who got herself out of bed with her femoral art line. It looked like there had been a homicide in that room! I agree with everybody else~ stop worrying about this one incident. You will make yourself scared to stick someone! BTW, our lab techs do our arterial blood gases for us, so don't be surprised if you are allowed to do this in some facilities.