Last night I accesed a port with a 20 g Huber needle, I had excellent blood return and it flushed great and I connected her IVF's. Well, 5 minutes later it was occluded. I was in another patients room so my CN went in to assess it. The CN noticed that the tubing had blue material in it, it was brought to the patient's attention. Of course "she couldnt see anything". The CN came to get me so I could go take a look at it and remove it. When I entered the room, the patient had already rushed and removed the needle herself and placed it in the sharps container before I could see it. She said that the CN told her to remove it! Now pleeeeaaaaaase, come up with something better than that! Now, I had admin Percocet just 5 minutes prior to all this transpiring. She had crushed that percocet and pushed it in her port! (she used to be a nurse, but her license had been suspended. Im suspecting drug abuse). She HAD to dig a flush out of the trash to do this with. Well, we pulled that needle out of the sharps container along with the previous one. Both had dried material in them. We saved them to show the physician on rounds this morning. But I left before they hit the floor. All night long, I was pushing Dilaudid and Phenergan. Finally I made her NPO. I told her that if she is that sick, then she doesnt need to be eating. (her admission was abd pain and n/v). The physician knows, he had written an order previously in all caps and LARGE print..."NO IV NARCOTICS", but then changed it the next day. I felt like a legal drug pusher last night. Then I had a cancer patient who was in miserable pain, with minimal pain control meds. I hate my job!
We had a patient in my ER about a year ago who dug an empty syringe out of the trash, sucked up poo and pee from her bedside commode and injected it into her line.
We had a patient in my ER about a year ago who dug an empty syringe out of the trash, sucked up poo and pee from her bedside commode and injected it into her line.
Specializes in Assisted Living, Med-Surg/CVA specialty.
That is why you should always stay and watch them swallow their meds.... sometimes you think you can trust your patients and you can't. That is really sad.
At the same time, couldnt the nurse be charged with negligence in this case, since she is required to witness all med admin.?
I always was taught there was NO excuse to not witness a patient swallow their meds.
No doubt. I have a problem with attempting to shift the blame onto the nurse rather than where it belongs.
Ultimately, as I know you know, in a court of law or the state BON they will say the same thing as this poster "What you're saying is you didn't witness the patient swallow the narcotics".
Nursing 101....nurses are always to blame for bad outcomes. Hopefully this thread won't go there and we'll stay supportive of a fellow nurse.
Drug users will do anything, trust me anything! Do not put blame on the nurse, I am sure it was cheeked or even vomited back up and used!
We had a guy come into the ER, after going into a withdrawal delirium, he decided to inject mayonnaise into his veins in the hope it would fix him. He died 2 hours later from fat embolism! THEY WILL DO ANYTHING.
BTW not saying that they are not sick and need help!
Ultimately, as I know you know, in a court of law or the state BON they will say the same thing as this poster "What you're saying is you didn't witness the patient swallow the narcotics".
Nursing 101....nurses are always to blame for bad outcomes. Hopefully this thread won't go there and we'll stay supportive of a fellow nurse.
I agree.
Someone who is no doubt as desperate as this patient can certainly manage to hide a med while appearing to swallow it.
Does anyone do a thorough oral search on every patient after administering po's? Heck, when I do (i.e. for those who are older, dehydrated, etc), I sometimes still find pills/caps that have stuck under the tongue, against the gumline or inside the cheeks even after they've gulped tons of water to wash them down. I've also checked patients only to turn around and find them chewing on the meds ... where the heck they were hiding, I have no clue.
Drug users will do anything, trust me anything! Do not put blame on the nurse, I am sure it was cheeked or even vomited back up and used!
We had a guy come into the ER, after going into a withdrawal delirium, he decided to inject mayonnaise into his veins in the hope it would fix him. He died 2 hours later from fat embolism! THEY WILL DO ANYTHING.
BTW not saying that they are not sick and need help!
I once had a customer who doused herself with lighter fluid, and lit it, so she could get drugs.
She died of something else (probably related to abusing her body in general) not long afterwards.
I also heard once about someone who injected peanut butter, just to see what would happen. Don't know what happened beyond that the person did survive.
Some years back, there was an abandoned factory somewhere (don't recall where it was) and kids would go in there and party. They found some 55-gallon drums of mercury, and one kid dipped a cigarette in it and smoked it to see what would happen.
He almost died of mercury poisoning, from inhaling the volatilized mercury.
One of the kids had to have almost all of their furniture and carpet replaced in their house, because s/he had tracked so much mercury in on their shoes and clothing. It was not safe to be in that house until all contaminated materials were removed.
catlynLPN
301 Posts
I'm sorry................I misread the OP.
You gave her the percocet and she crushed it and administered it thru the port.....
the patient did herself.
I see now. You failed to watcher her swallow the meds or she cheeked it and did it after you left the room.