Discharge patient with Foley, but forgot to give the syringes to remove foley

[Bamafan2011]

Hey, I'm a brand new nurse (working for 2 months), and I made a mistake. I discharge a patient with a Foley catheter as ordered. I got him the leg bag and a foley bag for bedtime. I got his paperwork signed and he left. The one thing I forgot to give him is the syringes for him to remove it. I didn't realize it until the day after the d/c. What should I do? Should I panic? Please let me know how to deal with the situation because this is the first time that happen to me.

[That Male Nurse]

25 yrs ago I would have nightmares about forgetting to give the insulin. Don't worry its very normal to worry like that. I mean who gets up in the morning and says to themselves,"Ok how badly can I screw this up today?'

[RN.on.the.move]

I am sorry to hear you were so upset over all of this. Is there a procedure your facility follows that indicates you must supply the patient with a syringe? If not then this is a real learning opportunity to complete a PI project. If there is then you really should talk this over with your supervisor, it should be written as a patient safety report. This should be done because if it happened to you it will happen to someone else and the outcome might not be the same the next time. I have had to remove urinary catheters before using STERILE scissors, but I have never used regular scissors much less cut the catheter on a routine basis. the recommendation to use sterile scissor is to err on the side patient in those rare but still possible "what if" moments. Using scissors should not be the go to answer just because it saves you time. I am a little disheartened to hear all the "jabs" at where healthcare is headed, your facility and so forth. But here is a little "jab" back not aimed at you but at another poster. If you do not know that you have had a STENT placed then maybe you should not be removing urinary catheters.

[bgxyrnf, MSN, RN]

What should I do? Should I panic?

Panicking is never a good thing because your rational mind ceases to function.