Do you do venipunctures as a nurse?

mama_d, BSN, RN · May 4, 2011

I learned blood draws in LPN school and then had to take an additional course (32 lecture hours & 8 clinical hours if I remember correctly) for IV certification.

No phlebotomy or IV team at my hospital, we do it ourselves. Which is somewhat unusual from what I've heard.

ETA: I worked as a tech while in nursing school, and did blood draws on the floor as a tech, so it didn't really make a difference that we covered it in school. I'd already been doing it as a tech for a few months by the time we covered it.

Horseshoe, BSN, RN · May 4, 2011

i have my bsn and have been out of school for a year and a half now. since graduation, i have worked in the psychiatric field which i love! i recently started working for a home health agency doing visits for psych patients. during the orientation, i had to complete a skills lab. one of the skills i had to complete was drawing blood. i was never taught how to do this during nursing school and have never had to complete this task in either clinicals or on the job. my hospital has a phlebotomist come in for all the blood draws. regardless, drawing blood is not that difficult of a task and i was able to get it right on the first try. what bothered me was the comment from the lady leading the skills lab saying how it was "scary" when i mentioned i had never done one before. this nurse is probably double my age, so nursing school is probably quite different from when she went. i was just wondering if any other recent grads did this during nursing school. i don't think my school taught it because 1) the majority of hospitals have their own lab people for blood draws and 2) if you can do an iv, a blood draw should be no problem. i was just a little offended by her comment and the possibility that she may have thought i was incompetent simply for never having done a venipuncture. in the end, it doesn't really matter because i was able to do it easily...but it just sparked my curiosity as to what other nurses have done. :)

wow, such confidence. i worked for years in the icu. we did our own blood draws-lab only drew on the floors.

it's "easy" until it isn't. if your patient has crappy veins, you can stick them all day with no luck. some days even the best nurses couldn't hit a barn-you can have a bad day. some patients required going up the chain of command until even the best were sweating it out. it's often not as easy as you are portraying it to be.

i graduated with a bsn in 1996 and we were taught to start iv's and draw blood, and did so in clinicals, but certainly not often enough to become proficient. that happened on the job.

mskate · May 4, 2011

I didn't learn it in nursing school, but was expected to know it when I started working. I learned on the job on patients.

Dazglue, ADN, BSN, MSN, RN · May 4, 2011

I am graduating from an ADN program in a couple of days and we were taught IV starts and blood draws the first week of 2nd semester and were able to perform then in clinical. We could stick anyone once over the age of 12. The only thing we were able to do in NICU was blood glucose checks.

lillymom · May 4, 2011

I have to say that this is something that surprises me. I can understand not learning phlebotomy but not doing IV's sounds crazy to me. They do it at my nursing school and they made us pincushions in the MA program during phlebotomy. We had to do two arm sticks on Thursday and two hand sticks on Friday on a different person for a whole semester. Not to mention various injections and finger sticks. We were made to do everything that we might encounter on the job on each other, except catheters.

I am a very hands on learner and reading sometimes doesn't quite soak in until I actually do it so not having any training would be hard for me. My thought would be that most hospitals would like someone to already be trained in those areas but I guess most of them give plently of orentation to learn everything else as well.

annv6 · May 4, 2011

PMFB - RN Just curious....you say your hospital won't hire direct entry Master's degree nurses anymore. Why? I just got accepted into a direct entry program and start in the fall. I don't want to waste my time and $$ if this is a dead end degree. Please advise.

hiddencatRN, BSN, RN · May 4, 2011

My school didn't teach IVs or blood draws in the program. None of the places I applied expected me to have IV skills as a new grad, so I think it's regional.

blinks14 · May 4, 2011

I also never learned how to do a venipuncture or IV in nursing school. All we learned in school was the theory behind placing an IV. But the school I went to was affiliated with a hospital that had an IV team (they don't anymore) so they didn't teach us and the lab techs came and drew the blood for you. About 7 months ago I started working at a different facility where the nurses do lab draws and place IV's so I had to learn. Sometimes I feel like I was done somewhat of a disservice by not having to perform those skills in my first 2 years in the profession.

CassB · May 4, 2011

Thanks for all the replies! While my school did teach how to do IVs...some students were not always happy with the amount of clinical experience they got in trying skills like that. One of my instructors made a good point about skills in general. You can teach nearly anyone how to do a skill in a matter of minutes and then through practice, they can perfect that skill whether they are a nurse or not. Nursing school is to teach critical thinking skills, disease management, and other various aspects of nursing. Nursing school is not just about learning skills. If that was the case, I doubt it would be considered one of the hardest undergraduate paths one can take. As for the person who said he or she may take a phlebotomy course for an additional cost, I would save your money. As it sounds, the norm is that new grads are not expected to know or certainly not have a high skill set in the IV/venipuncture area.

PMFB-RN, RN · May 4, 2011

PMFB - RN Just curious....you say your hospital won't hire direct entry Master's degree nurses anymore. Why? I just got accepted into a direct entry program and start in the fall. I don't want to waste my time and $$ if this is a dead end degree. Please advise.

*** Well I didn't say they won't hire them. I said I didn't think they would. It's not like there was an official proclamation or policy change. I say that based on discussions I have had with management, other preceptors, and things that have been said by administration in staff meetings. There seems to be a widely held opinion that the direct entry masters grads have too little clinical preparation and too much entitlement attitude. At first there was a lot of excitement to hire them when two area state universities started graduating them. It was thought that that they would not be so quick to leave for CRNA school and would be well prepared. We hired 7 that I know of for sure starting in 2008 (none still work for the hospital) and all of them were from those two programs. A couple of them even complained to management that they didn't feel it was appropriate for masters prepared nurses to be precepted by ADN prepared preceptors, this despite the fact that those preceptors have vast amounts of experience in the SICU and CCRN certification, and the fact that our nurse manager is an ADN prepared nurse.

It may very well be that this general opinion has been unfairly formed based on too few examples from only two programs. I believe that to be the case. FYI we are a large (for this state) tertiary care, Magnet certified trauma hospital.

I certainly am in no position to say how direct entry masters are thought of in other areas and other hospitals.

Here are some comments from others on the subject from a different discussion:

https://allnurses.com/nursing-career-advice/accelerated-bsn-msn-560205.html#post5081077

tewdles, RN · May 4, 2011

I consider intravenous skills part of the basic skill set for RNs...not expertise necessarily, but certainly basic technical skills.

Many RNs may not start IVs or draw blood in the acute care hospital setting, but, outside of that setting we are often the discipline charged with those tasks.

JeanettePNP, MSN, RN, NP · May 4, 2011

Blood draws and IV starts were not part of the official nursing school curriculum because of liability, but our clinical instructor (an ER nurse manager) took it on her own initiative to make sure that each student completed at least one blood draw or IV start. I also took an IV cert class after graduation, but alas I haven't had an opportunity to practice that skill since then.