My starting ratio...

[JBizzleRN, ADN, RN]

Hello to everybody! Let me give you a little background information about myself. I graduated from the University of Southern Mississippi in 2007. I currently work on a Med/Surg floor in Hattiesburg, MS. Most of the time we have 4 nurses on the floor with an average of 8-9 patients per nurse (crazy I know as we have dialysis patient's getting CAPD, ICU-Stepdown patients [our ICU stepdown closed] peds pts, fresh surgeries, and good ole OB patients...). As I'm coming up on my one year anniversary, I am a little bit concerned. I love my job (yes, even with the big patient load). Everybody says that I do a good job as a new nurse, my yearly evaulation was great, but my biggest concern is this....I've figured it up that I have about a 50/50 chance of sucessful IV insertion...I can draw blood with the best of them, infact I often get called for the "hard sticks" but starting IVs just seems to be an obstacle I have yet to overcome. And it's not from the lack of practice, not a day goes by without somebody's IV infiltrating, or it being time to change the site. Will it get better in time? It's just discouraging to have to ask someone else to start my IV after I've missed twice? Then that nurse will go in there and start it with no problem....that I just don't understand...I guess maybe it will come with practice, but it's just confusing as to why I have such a hard time starting them...

Anyway just wanting some two-cents on the subject...

[november17, ASN, RN]

You know , it's just an artform. I kept trying and trying and one day it just clicked for me. It helped that my original nursing school preceptor was a former phlebotomist, but I never really got it for about 6 months and many hit or miss IV starts.

Her words/advice always floated around in my head when I was starting IVs though. One night, it suddenly made sense and my brain and hands just made the connection.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not super great at starting IVs. It just clicked.

Even more silly? I've become pretty proficient at starting IVs on invisible veins, just doing it by touch. I've found I can easily do IVs on people that are "hard starts" or "rolley veins"

Wanna hear something dumb though? I have a harder time starting them on plainly visible veins!!! A big thing for me is advancing the needle. either advance it too far, blowing the vein, or not far enough, make the catheter impossible to get in all the way.I keep practicing on those pesky suckers...trying not to traumatize my patients too badly. I stick to the 2 sticks and pass it on to someone else rule though.

My advice is to stick to "bouncy" veins...veins you can palpate, and feel firm when tapped lightly with the tip of your finger.