What's wrong with this picture?

Nursing Students General Students

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OK, fellow nursing students: what's wrong with this picture, and what would your clinical instructor say to you if you did an injection like this?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126048234340586333.html

I am sorry the paper printed the nurse's name, as I don't want to bash an individual nurse. But I thought the photo was very instructive for us nursing students!

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Specializes in ER.

Nothing.

I assume she's using alcohol cleanser between patients.

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Nothing. I don't wear gloves to give injections, either, unless the client is on some specific type of precautions that requires them.

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Specializes in Psych ICU, addictions.

All but one of my instructors would have asked me why I wasn't wearing gloves.

The one who wouldn't have asked about the gloves would have found something else to criticize...like, why aren't I doing a Z-track or that I should have gone in at a different angle or did I ask them about allergies to eggs or why was I wearing blue that day :)

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  1. She is not wearing gloves.
  2. She has her mouth hanging open, just asking for that one in a million accident, blood spurt, pt vomit, etc.
  3. She is bending over, her back will be killing her tomorrow.

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CDC doesn't require gloves, bu my instructors say it is a must on both hands. You never know when you will encounter a bleeder. Better to be safe than sorry.

Really the only thing I see is that she is squeezing the shoulder instead in "Z tracking" or just leaving it flat.

She isn't practicing good body mechanics but that is not required, just smart. I did a couple of flu clinics and I only got up for one, all the others I sat down for.

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Specializes in Home Care.

In nursing school we're taught to wear gloves and aspirate for IM injections.

I work in a flu clinic daily giving over 130 or so injections a day. I rarely wear gloves and never aspirate.

Her body mechanics suck, she probably posed like that for the picture. At least you can't see her boobs. LOL

I'm gonna dream about arms and syringes tonight, I can see it now.

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Besides the article being filled with scare tactics about the swine flu....ummm, I'm guessing you're talking about wearing no gloves. Yeah...it's gross! I don't know why anyone would give an injection without gloves. The hospital I did clinicals at had a similar picture hanging all over the hospital with the slogan "get your flu shot". The nurse wasn't wearing gloves....ugh!

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Specializes in Emergency Dept. Trauma. Pediatrics.
In nursing school we're taught to wear gloves and aspirate for IM injections.

I work in a flu clinic daily giving over 130 or so injections a day. I rarely wear gloves and never aspirate.

Her body mechanics suck, she probably posed like that for the picture. At least you can't see her boobs. LOL

I'm gonna dream about arms and syringes tonight, I can see it now.

In my school we just did injections and we were taught not to aspirate for Vaccines, that it was the only IM injections we don't aspirate for and we don't aspirate SubQ

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Specializes in med/surg, telemetry, IV therapy, mgmt.

i would have been holding the syringe at the connection between the needle and the barrel to stabilize it better. i would have had the patient drop his arm to his side to relax the muscle.

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Daytonite said what I was thinking. My instructors always tell us to stabilize the syringe by holding it near the barrel/needle connection. And if I tried to give an injection without gloves, they would stay STOP very loudly. :) I guess that comes from an abundance of caution, but it's OK with me!

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Looks like she is giving the inject to low. And why would she squeeze the skin for an IM injection? It's not getting into the muscle

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