First successful IV start

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Specializes in LTC, Rural, OB.

This is incredibly exciting for me. I attempted to start an IV on my partner earlier this week and then even tried one on my instructor with guided help from another instructor and was not successful. I was pretty bummed. My partner managed just fine on my crappy veins and many of my other classmates were successful posting pictures on facebook, bumming me out more. Today I went in determined to get it done. I was a little shaky beforehand, I just get shaky with stuff like this. I don't like being poked so I don't want to poke someone else. I found the vein and with a little guidance from my instructor successfully got it in the vein on the first try. I was so excited when I saw that flashback. Of course I still had to do the rest of the set up and was shaking so bad I had to sit and breathe in and out for a couple seconds. Now I feel I could do it on a real patient and hopefully will be less shaky. I was not shaky when I put the needle in, which I feel is important :)

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Yay YOU! Congratulations!

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Specializes in Med/surg, Onc.

Woohoo. Once you get a few under your belt they won't be so nerve wracking. My school doesn't have us do them on each other so my first one was on a patient. It was awesome to get the first one out of the way.

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Specializes in Emergency Department.

Congratulations! You'll come to realize that IV starts are both incredibly easy and something that can kick your butt... fortunately, not usually in the same stick.

Incidentally, when I first learned the skill, we practiced on each other. My partner was the class bloodletter. He darned near soaked 1/2 of a chux before he got the IV tubing secured to the catheter hub...

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Specializes in LTC, Rural, OB.

I was amazed at myself that I dripped no blood at all and my partner today did not either on my easily bled veins, that is until he took the catheter out...ya he forgot to fold up the 2x2 and put enough pressure on it...fortunately it was not too bad. Next week, central line care...bring on 2nd year :)

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Specializes in Medical Oncology, ER.

good job! keep practicing :)

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Specializes in ICU / PCU / Telemetry / Oncology.

Practice makes perfect! I used to dread putting in IVs until I got about two of them on my own then my confidence was forever changed. I love doing them now, provided of course I am not pressed for time.

Sent from my Samsung Droid Charge using allnurses.com

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Congratulations! :up:

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Specializes in Oncology/hematology.

Congratulations! I did my first last week on a fellow student and this week on a patient. I got both on the first try. I feel so accomplished. ;)

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Congratulations! IV starts is one of those things that just takes practice... it can't really be taught so much as it just needs to be learned.

Fair warning: You *will* go through stints where you can't start a line for anything. *When* that happens, go easy on yourself and don't let your confidence be shaken - it happens to everybody, even the experienced nurses.

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Specializes in Tele.

We don't even practice or learn to start IVs in our school :/ I think we practice on a dummy arm but how much can I possibly learn from that.

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Specializes in Emergency Department.
We don't even practice or learn to start IVs in our school :/ I think we practice on a dummy arm but how much can I possibly learn from that.

What you learn from practicing on a dummy arm is the mechanics of starting an IV. You learn how to do site preparation, IV line preparation, and the like. On a dummy IV arm, you really don't learn IV site selection because everything is really obvious. For that, what you need to do is practice, practice, practice on a real person. One of the reasons you need to do this is because a dummy IV arm does not have veins that inflate when you put the tourniquet on.

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