dating saline in the warmers

Hellllllo Nurse, BSN, RN · Feb 13, 2004

I have never dated saline in the warmers, but I have known a few nurses that would date anything that was warm......but enough of that.
bob

:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

lcunn · Feb 25, 2004

are other places dating there saline irrigation in the warmers and taking them out after three days.
our OR told us that all the saline and water in plastic bottles have to be dated when they are placed in the warmer and taken out three days later if not used becuase the plastic breaks down in the warmers and after three days they are no good.

Our saline and water are from Abbott. We date all containers and use them within 2 weeks as stated in Abbotts newsletter dated 2/14/04 to me The person I spoke with at Abbott was Imelda Uy RN BSN 1-800-615-0187

qbfan413 · Mar 4, 2004

we've been doing 2 weeks

Ferret · Mar 5, 2004

I found a letter form BAXTER dated 1993 saying 2 weeks at work today, and it gave a few reasons like evaporation changing the concentrates of additves.

I can give more details if anyone is interested.

giaryan · Apr 6, 2004

Does anyone know WHERE in the JCAHO regs it addresses this topic specifically? I would greatly appreciate the help Thanks.

are other places dating there saline irrigation in the warmers and taking them out after three days.
our OR told us that all the saline and water in plastic bottles have to be dated when they are placed in the warmer and taken out three days later if not used becuase the plastic breaks down in the warmers and after three days they are no good.

CIRQL8 · Apr 8, 2004

I need some more info as well....

My manager states that JCAHO does NOT dictate temperature or time restrictions on things of that nature, they only check to see if an institution is following their own policies and procedures.

We are interested in some firm documentation that supports a temperature and/or time restriction on sterile saline/water bottles either from a health department, or if it in fact does have a policy, JCAHO. Anyone know of this??

P.S. - if you are interested.. at this time we rotate stock as warmers are refilled, have no time restrictions, warm the bottles to 140 farenheit, and add room temp saline/water if need be to the field. We have 3 warmers to share between 15 working Operating Rooms. Hopefully in the near future the red tape will be cut and we will have a new department under construction!

Thank You,

Dave

(P.S. - this is my 1st post!! Happy 'Birthday' to me!)

CIRQL8 · Apr 11, 2004

I Will try to paste what ABBOTT sent me regarding keeping fluids warmed, but in short, for the AQULYTE soln. (Saline for irrigation) they recommend a max temp of 150 degrees Frenheit, and a max strage time of 60 days, and not to re-warm fluids.

Dave.

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OK, I cannot paste!!! I guess that you will have to take my word for it!!

Chrislynn2003 · Apr 23, 2004

We date saline and sterile water in the warmer. We never have a problem with it being expired though cause we use it so often.

Christine

prinzejoseph · May 2, 2004

We date saline and water in the warmer and discard them after our shift on that same day. In orthopaedic cases, we open fresh saline and water in every case.