Question on IV electrolytes, please help!

Nursing Students Student Assist

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Which IV electrolytes should be well diluted and never given as an IV bolus? Why?

I am looking through pages to pages on my text book but can't pin point the answer:crying2:!!

Thank you

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The answer is KCl=potassium chloride.

It causes the heart to stop and will kill someone if given IVPush or given too quickly.

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

The 6 major electrolytes are potassium, calcium, sodium, chloride, magnesium and phosphate. Calcium can be given IV push. Calcium is only given IV in rare cases where a parathyroid gland has been accidentally removed in surgery. Sodium, chloride and phosphate are used in combination with many other drugs anyway and never given individually. Phosphates and calcium are best replaced orally. That leaves. . .

  • Potassium given by direct IV push will cause arrhythmias and put the patient in heart block causing cardiac arrest
  • Magnesium given IV push rapid injection causes CNS depression, circulatory collapse, hypotension, and asystole,

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Impressive answer! Thank you so much ; )

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Thank you so much for taking your time to answer my silly question! I really appreciated.

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

your question is not silly at all. i know of someone who got in serious trouble because they were ready to draw up 20meq of kcl and give it iv push. they would have killed the patient if someone hadn't realized what was going on and stopped them. this is one of the reasons kcl was removed from the nursing units as a stock med. in my time we had it stocked on the unit like ns and sterile water and no one thought anything of it.

kcl is what they give to kill people for the lethal injection for execution because it stops the heart.

when kcl needs to be given iv to bring the potassium levels up rapidly it is always mixed in 100cc of d5w or ns, placed on a pump and infused over an hour. no more than 10meq is given per hour. it is very irritating to the peripheral veins and sometime lidocaine is mixed with it to help numb the vein. some places will only allow the icus to infuse kcl this way.

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Thank you for the story... as a first year nursing student I have not done any of IV administration yet. All these what I am learning right now, electrolytes and others, are really important to remember when I face the time. I will remember what you told me. I can make mistakes on the paper tests, but not with the real patient care!

Thank you!!

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