allergy injection question

Nursing Students Student Assist

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I was wondering something: with an irritating injection, like insulin, you don't aspirate as a placement check, you just give it. Does that apply with anything potentially irritating, such as a bee venom injection, or does checking placement in subq tissue vs a blood vessel take priority?

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Specializes in Gerontological, cardiac, med-surg, peds.

Depends on the type of the injection: is it subcutaneous or intramuscular? You do not aspirate any subcutaneous injections. You do not massage insulin or heparin. As for IM injections, you do aspirate. Hope this helps :)

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Depends on the type of the injection: is it subcutaneous or intramuscular? You do not aspirate any subcutaneous injections. You do not massage insulin or heparin. As for IM injections, you do aspirate. Hope this helps :)

Thanks....it does :) We were taught "when in doubt, aspirate" (except heparin and insulin) for ANY injection. Lots of discussion about whether it was necessary or not, with the end result being "better be safe than sorry". As for me, if I shouldn't aspirate, why WOULD I?

The injection I'm referring to is SQ, bee venom. I know it's specifically for desensitization, so it makes sense to NOT massage either, but I did wonder about aspiration. I guess the answer is 'don't' :)

Thank you!

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