I put each medication in a separate med cup. For two simple reasons. One because that is hospital policy and two because of a experience that I had when I went to the patient's room with the medication in separate cups and the patient told me at that time that he was having diarrhea. Because I had them in separate cups, I was able to remove the liquid colace and toss it. If the meds were mixed together, liquid or crushed, I would not have been able to do that.
Also, a third reason is that if the state comes, they watch to make sure the medication is in separate cups.
Most meds go down by gravity very quickly. If the pt has gas that might slow things up a bit. On some occasions, I was giving the pt Jevity 1.5 bolus by gravity and it went a little slow but my patient was able and willing to hold it while it went through. She had to learn how to do it anyway when she went home!
What I am told, pushing fluids should only be done in the ICU. It could make them vomit, etc.
Sep 21, '11 by birdie22thanks for the tip about the hot water! I honestly dont even know the policy at our place about gravity vs. pushing. I've seen it done both ways by a lot of nurses. We get a lot of peg tubes on our floor. I usually push with the peg and use gravity with the NG due to the higher sensitivity for the patient. Oh, and I always mix everything together except for the BP meds (in case I have to hold them with a low BP).
Sep 22, '11 by Grasshopper11I put each medication in a separate med cup. For two simple reasons. One because that is hospital policy and two because of a experience that I had when I went to the patient's room with the medication in separate cups and the patient told me at that time that he was having diarrhea. Because I had them in separate cups, I was able to remove the liquid colace and toss it. If the meds were mixed together, liquid or crushed, I would not have been able to do that.
