Caring for Jehovah's witnesses

Bypass can be used, as long as it is not primed with blood. As long as the blood remains in circulation, bypass is acceptable.

Thanks, PANurseRN1, that satisfies my curiosity.

Hey, heard there are laws or principles about Nurses' rights to refuse to give treatments against their spiritual beliefs. Has anyone encountered these? Please share.

Oh my gosh Im so excited about this topic. These are really great questions!
First of all, I am an witness and an RN also. I am soooo glad to see that there are so many of us on here. I would love to get to know you all. Its good to have the support.

As far as on pump CABG goes...
Yes, technically the blood leaves the body, but a lot of witnesses view the pump as a temporary extension of their circulatory system since the integrity of the system is never actually broken. There was an article in the Awake magazine about this in 1989 (I think it was 89). It boils down to this: The bible commands us not to "eat" blood, which would obviously include IV infusions. The bible does not specifically mention things like: on pump CV surgeries, albumin, cell savers, dialysis, etc... These things are left to the patient to make a personal decision about. They have to consider their understanding of the scriptures and they have to become educated regarding the treatment modalities. Then they make a decision based on THEIR OWN CONSCIENCE. This is why you will see some accept one thing that another would refuse. Hope this helps.

I'm glad this topic came up b/c I have been wondering about this myself. I would like to say as I did in another post that there are over 100 bloodless hospitals worldwide. This shows that there are alternatives to blood transfusions and people should realize that. Also, I had a friend of mine who was in a car accident and needed surgery. The physicians did not want to do it b/c her hemoglobin count was too low. The nurses pressured her to take blood and were nasty to us, her friends, and made the situation worse for her by trying to make her feel dumb for not taking it. Some friends of mine got together and made a juice(pure)from beets, carrots and raw eggs and gave it to her for a week. Just after a couple of days, her count started going up and after the week, was good enough to do the surgery. Was it the juice? Well, research shows that beets do have blood building properties. The nurses had to eat their words. The point is that there is not ONLY ONE SOLUTION to a problem. Just b/c a popular solution is used, doesn't mean it is the best or the only one; blood transfusion or not, professionals and patients should look for other solutions to a variety of ailments.

I realize that it has been a while since this post has been visited, but I thought I would offer my experience...

I too am a Jehovah's Witness and my first daughter was born at 27 wks gestation and weight 1lb 9oz. I didn't go into preterm labor but, by chance, had a routine ultrasound that found that the fluid in my amniotic sac was low and during following tests they found that Kaylee's heart rate dropped substantially and was irratic and so they performed an emergency CS.

My husband and I not only had to deal with her prematurity and adjusting to the situation but had to confront our beliefs of not accepting blood under any circumstances. The first hospital she was born at said they would transfuse at about 40 hematocrit level. She was tranferred to Sunset Kaiser in LA and they said they would let it drop to 30 before tranfusion was forced. We maintained hourly contact with her doctors and nurses and hand in hand with our liason committee kept track of her status. We did what we could to find alternative procedures and was even able to organize meetings between her doctors and other MD's who had dealt with the situation before.

We assured the doctors that alternative treatments were acceptable to us and they proceeded with EPO, iron, and other blood boosters. We were able to get them to agree to minimize blood draws and focus on her status rather than just the numbers.

She was then transferred to a bloodless unit in Encino/Tarzana Regional Medical Center where they assured us they would do what they could but if all else failed the only alternative was transfusion. We held firm to our stand, but realized the doctor's did not have a choice, for their own ethical reasons, and had her best interests at heart.

She underwent a surgery to fix the PDA that medicine could not. It was during this surgery that we feared the worst. They came out and we breathed a sigh of relief when they said she made it through okay and again when they said they were able to do the surgury without blood loss. Her hematocrit dropped to 11 in that hospital... and then it started rising on it's own. The EPO and alternatives began working, along with her own body.

She suffered no brain bleeds, no brain damage, no CP, no ROP... the only signs she has of being a preemie is the scar from her surgery and asthma. All without blood. We understand that we were very fortunate and that other families, JW or not, have had to face other circumstances.

We encountered doctors that were kind... as well as those who chastized us for our beliefs. We endured threats of medical custody being taken away from us. But we will always be grateful to the doctors, nurses, administrative staff and others who were so willing to help us through the hard times.

We have kept in touch with the hospital Kaylee was born at. Since that time, they were able to write new procedures for dealing with preemies of JW parents and even held a staff conference to educate them on what to do in the event they were faced with the situation again. We can be happy that our stand will help other families in this same situation in the future.

I hope this helps...

-Lisa

Lisa,
Thanks for sharing your personal story, its really great to hear someones personal experience. I am so glad everything turned out well with your baby.

We have a bloodless hospital in my town and although I only went in for minor surgery I was so very pleased with all they did to accomidate my beliefs they were really well informed and had alot of practices in place for those who wished to go blood free, it was very encouraging, and quite a change from the hospital I had had my daughter in.

catherine

WE had an incident recently where the nurse had administered albumin to a Jehovah's Witness patient. Every safeguard was broken. Usually we have to have a blood consent to get the albumin because it was 2 am and the nurse could not find the blood consent (because it didnt exist) the lab dispensed the albumin thinking a consent was not needed for albumin. The next day it hit the fan..the nurse manger had to explain to the patients husband what had happened. He was ok with it when shown that the albumin was clear and had no "red" color but I would hate to think a nurse had
damned her poor soul for giving her something she didn't want. (the pateint was sedated on the vent)

Hello cu-n-hvn I am commending you for showing interest on the reasons why and how Jehovah's Witnesses deal with blood. While it is true that we value our lives, It is more important for us to follow what the Bible said about the importance of obeying God and His principles regarding the use of blood. And with this principle in mind, we JWs consider disobeying Him worse than death itself. It is simply inspiring to know that other nonJW's could reach such extent as to give time and effort to understand our stand. Thanks a lot.

While consent is certainly important and needed per your facility, let me assure you that her "soul" would not have been "damned." It was a honest mistake, first of all, and second, Witnesses don't believe in damnation of a soul.

Actually, albumin falls in to the realm of a personal conscience decision. It's considered a minor blood fraction, so some Witnesses will accept it and others will not. Other minor blood fraction products would include Rhogam, PolyHeme (or other synthetic blood substitutes), etc.