2 glove technique? HUHH?

Nurses Safety

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OK, so today one of the Respiratory therapist had some time and was nice enough to let me shadow him as he was caring for a pt that frequently decannulates. ( I work in LTACH). He put on two pair of clean gloves and then a sterile pair on top of that to make him "extra sterile"? I asked him about that technique and he said that was the 2 glove technique. I am new here and don't want to appear insane but, really......I have never heard of this. Is this specific to Respiratory Therapy or is this guy pulling my chain. We were replacing a trach strap.

I thanked him for his time and went to finish up my pateints. Has anyone else heard of this?

possibly , multiple glove technique may be applied during an operating room procedure on a single patient, on a single sterile area. When the outer glove ruptures , torn by needles , or by mere pressure exerted during procedures , it is possible to remove torn glove and continue with procedure, unless the the next pair of gloves are sterile. which I think is not because there are gloves which has powdered substance applied during production of the gloves or practiced by other professional on putting talcum on the hands to help ease the wearing of the gloves or to absorb moisture from the hands after scrubbing.These powders are foreign bodies that may enter the sterile area, may cause infection on the outcome of the procedure. In using a single glove technique, when a surgeon ruptures his gloves and the patients body fluids were able to penetrate the torn glove and comes in contact with surgeons hand , what does he do? He will be removing the torn gloves to check his hand or skin for any penetration , at this point his hand is already contaminated with patient's body fluids, will he immediately ask from the scrub nurse for an immediate replacement of the gloves , put them on his body fluid stained hands, or will he walk away from sterile area , do an immediate scrub and re-gloving before continuing procedure. This reply is for those who practice double or multiple gloving for consecutive patients, who are within operating room premises, or are conducting examinations on several patients, one after the other. If you think that I am incorrect , then explain your side, if you think I am correct then let this be a lesson , who are lazy enough to re-glove after every patient.

Specializes in Emergency & Trauma/Adult ICU.

pagaaruga, your post was the only reference to an OR environment in the entire thread ... and the only reference to the concept of multiple gloving and moving from patient to patient with the same gloves. All other replies addressed the OP's stated scenario of caring for one patient not currently in an OR setting.

I double glove when I start IVs or foleys (sterile gloves on top for foleys). With IVs, once the site is secured with Tegaderm, I will pull off the first set of usually somewhat bloody gloves and I will still be gloved (cleanly) to label and package the blood samples. Same with foleys - once the sterile gloves come off I still am gloved to handle and package the urine sample.

TWO layers of gloves to start an IV? How on earth do you feel a vein? Impressive, to me.

I've never heard of using sterile gloves to start an IV, either, though....

Specializes in LTC, camp nursing, LTAC (new to this).

I appreciate all the responses, I may have missed some sarcasm from the OT when he used the term "extra Sterile" which is one of the things that made me go "huhh?". I have watched the RT's and it seems that what they are doing is wearing clean gloves under sterile gloves to Suction and then capturing the suction tubing in the sterile glove as they remove it. This makes sense now that I have seen it in practice by some very conscientious RT's.

Also, totally makes sense for a code brown or other Icky situation. This was all done on only one pt and then hands were washed before we left the room. I hope I didn't give the wrong impression that he was removing one pair of gloves and then moving to another pt with the other pair underneath.

Sterile gloves for IV starts? I just use clean gloves but not a bad idea.

Specializes in Emergency, Pre-Op, PACU, OR.
TWO layers of gloves to start an IV? How on earth do you feel a vein? Impressive, to me.

I've never heard of using sterile gloves to start an IV, either, though....

Haha, it works when you have the nice, easy sticks with the gardenhose veins that are visible from across the room. If I have a harder stick, I sometimes feel first, then put a second set on, and if it is a challenging stick, I might have to skip the second set altogether.

That was my first thought too

I went back to the original post, come to think of it , the therapist was actually doing the double-glove technique not to be "extra sterile" for the patient but as an extra protection for himself. Even so hope my point of references be noted to clarify the proper gloving techniques used inside or outside the OR , I also know we nurses are also taking extra precaution in trying to protect ourselves from the hazards of the profession.

Specializes in med-surg.

Gloves are primarily for caregivers protection, not patients, and they are permeable. And the longer you wear them and more your hands sweat, more permeable they are, no mather if you have 2, 3 or 10 layers.

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