I had a 90 something patient admitted for SBO. She did not speak a word of english so I could only base my asessment on objective data. She was NPO, had NG tube that drained ~400 cc over my shift, IV fluid @75 cc/hr. She was drowsy throughtout the shift (had sleeping pill & antipsychotic meds), chest clear, VSSA, abdomen slightly distended w/ faint BSX4. Voided twice in bedpan. I checked on her regularly and she seemed fine.
So I went on my break and told my covering nurse to do a set of vitals in an hour. When I came back the nurse told me that when she went to do her vitals her sats were 70% on 2L O2 via NP. She had coorifice crackles thoughtout her lung fields and bladder scanned for 400 cc. Raised O2 to 5L and sats remained in low 80%. Throughtout this time her VS continued to be WNL, RR was 20/min. Breathing fine, not using accessory muscles. Rousable to speech. RT was called and she was placed on high flow O2 mask @ 80%. Sats slowly rose to >95%. Resident paged & ordered chest x-ray, abx, lasix, and something else that escapes my memory.
I was shocked that such a fast change would occur within an hour. I was also wondering what happened - I know that it could not have been fluid overload - she wasn't getting much. She was also peeing fine and her NG output was Ok. Someone said that she could have aspirated - but how with an NG tube? She was in semi-fowler's throughtout my shift and I can't really figure out what happened. I left before the results of the x-ray came.
What do you guys think? I can't stop thinking about her and wondering if I missed something...
