Giving tylenol to a family member.

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So I just got home from work and I had a frustrating incident. A family member asked if I had some tylenol for her. She had a headache and her husband was very sick and it was 2am. I told her I probably had some in my purse. When I mentioned it to one of the older RNs she said it was outside of my scope of practice because I was then "prescribing"??? It was my own personal supply of tylenol, its an over the counter medication, it was an adult who had a headache, I had already clocked out and was getting ready to leave. I gave it to her despite this other RN telling me I could lose my license. Was I wrong? I live in the state of Texas, I've read my NPA and I intepret it much differently than she did. Thoughts? Advice?

Specializes in ICU + Infection Prevention.

There is a difference between:

"I, Nurse So and So as a licensed medical professional am advising YOU to take these meds. Here."

and

"OUCH! If it was me, I'd take some Tylenol."

The big difference is that this is on the job, not at home.

Common sense is not allowed. It always astounds me how some people think that a nurse has LESS ability to apply common sense in personal situations than the common person. If they ran the world, tomorrows headline would read: 10 million mothers charged with practicing medicine without a license.

It's just as asinine as a facility that forbids nursing students from doing CPR if they are first on scene. It's CPR! The patient is DEAD!

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Nursing students not doing CPR?? WHAT??? :eek: Remind me not to go to that hospital. Yikes!

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Specializes in Medsurg/ICU, Mental Health, Home Health.

If I'm working, the only meds I'm administering are under a physician's order or ACLS protocol.

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All of you who are telling the OP that she was outside her scope of practice need to get a grip.

This happened outside of the workplace, at home. She was approached by a family member who asked her if she had some Tylenol. The family member did not ask what the OP would recommend for pain, so the OP did not assess and prescribe. The OP used her own supply of Tylenol, something she obviously keeps around for personal use, and gave it to the family member. There is an enormous difference between dispensing a medication and using an OTC from your own bottle at home. We do this all the time. The is the point of having bottles of OTC meds with instructions on the labels in the home. That is what they are for.

If we insist on acting and reacting in fear and seek confirmation every time we have a teensie doubt, we will end up immobilized by anxiety and afraid to even act for ourselves. I can't believe educated nurses who should know better are behaving in this ignorant and dependent manner. Your behavior is embarrassing.

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Family members are a grey area for this sort of thing. Even if they're not technically your patient, they're still included in health teaching, possibly transfers and personal care, you'd still call a code if they collapsed, and you'd still notice if they had cold symptoms and take action (if only to ask them to leave). And advocates of the "family-centred care" theory might say that they literally are your patients too. So you have to be careful.

Having said that, I'd probably give the lady a Tylenol too, if it were 2am and if she seemed to me like a reasonable person. If the hospital drug store were open, I wouldn't do it. If she seemed to me like somebody who would complain about nonsense or make foolish decisions, I would hesitate.

While at work, I've given Advil to other nurses without hesitation, and I'd do the same for any other coworker, even if they didn't have any medical training (i.e., clerks and housekeeping).

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All of you who are telling the OP that she was outside her scope of practice need to get a grip.

This happened outside of the workplace, at home. She was approached by a family member who asked her if she had some Tylenol. The family member did not ask what the OP would recommend for pain, so the OP did not assess and prescribe. The OP used her own supply of Tylenol, something she obviously keeps around for personal use, and gave it to the family member. There is an enormous difference between dispensing a medication and using an OTC from your own bottle at home.

If we insist on acting and reacting in fear and seek confirmation every time we have a teensie doubt, we will end up immobilized by anxiety and afraid to even act for ourselves. I can't believe educated nurses who should know better are behaving in this ignorant and dependent manner. Your behavior is embarrassing.

Please read the opening post more carefully before you express contempt for other posters. The OP was at work, and the lady was a patient's family member, not the OP's family member.

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I'll make it even easier with no pharmacological agents involved.

Visitor to me, ... "Nurse, I'm diabetic and feeling a bit faint, would you please take my blood sugar, pressure, and pulse?"

My response,.."No Madam, but have a seat here and a cup of water while I get a wheelchair escort to take you to the ER."

Do nothing for visitors short of ABC's and CPR, that can be construed as treatment outside of the ED.

Post script,

Unknown Pharmacological agent, is what the ambulance chaser would call your Tylenol after the visitor has that hemorrhagic stroke with residual deficits at home that was already developing when she was with you.

Damn, sometimes I toy with the idea of law school! Easy Pickings!

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Specializes in Psych/CD/Medical/Emp Hlth/Staff ED.

I had a similar situation once; a patient's wife asked for a tylenol since she usually takes one at night for her arthritis. We had no policy and nobody knew the answer, the house manager decided the wife should go the ED to get her tylenol. I sent her down to the ED a little before 0100, she didn't get back until about 0500. She was in her 90's and hadn't slept much the night before since that is when her husband was admitted, she ended up getting about 4 hours of sleep over 2 nights.

Because of this and other similar instances, we looked into this more and the answer we got from our BON is that my state's good samaritan law is very broad, and you can't be held accountable for things you do off the clock that could otherwise be questionable if you were getting paid. Even so, the compliance officer we spoke also shared that he couldn't imagine pursuing action against a nurse who supplied a family member with non-hospital-stock tylenol even if they were on the clock and even if there were some sort of adverse consequence since their expectation is that we provide care to all using reasonable judgement (not irrational paranoia).

In a perfect world, everyone would have policies that address this, although that is rarely the case. I followed my desire to avoid the worst thing that could happen and protect myself, which ended up making a 90 year old woman wait 4 hours in the middle of the night for a tylenol that she takes every night with no adverse effects, I'm not sure that I didn't actually end up causing the worst thing that could happen.

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Specializes in Psych/CD/Medical/Emp Hlth/Staff ED.
I'll make it even easier with no pharmacological agents involved.

Visitor to me, ... "Nurse, I'm diabetic and feeling a bit faint, would you please take my blood sugar, pressure, and pulse?"

My response,.."No Madam, but have a seat here and a cup of water while I get a wheelchair escort to take you to the ER."

Do nothing for visitors short of ABC's and CPR, that can be construed as treatment outside of the ED.

Post script, Unknown Pharmacological agent, is what the ambulance chaser would call your Tylenol after the visitor has that hemorrhagic stroke with residual deficits at home that was already developing when she was with you.

That sounds ridiculous, I don't even know where to begin on this one, even ignoring the supposed tylenol/hemorrhagic stroke connection.

I can't imagine coming to work everyday just hoping to not get sued.

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I think the sue happy people in this world has RUINED it! I can't stand our legal system when it ignores common sense.

If someone is asking for a tylenol, chances are, they know if they have liver disease or are allergic.

I would have totally given the person a tylenol if they asked me.

If we have to do this in a "politically correct"/policy way, I guess I would have (like the person did above) left the tylenol in a public bathroom, saying that sometimes visitors leave their tylenol in there.

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Please read the opening post more carefully before you express contempt for other posters. The OP was at work, and the lady was a patient's family member, not the OP's family member.

I read it very carefully, especially the very first sentence were it says the OP had just gotten home from work and a family member asked her if she had some Tylenol.

Please read the opening post more carefully before you express contempt for other posters, okay?

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Takeone...that is the way I read it also until I reread it. It seems she was approached at the hospital and gave the lady a tylenol. She was at home when she posted on the board. I was drawing the same conclusion as you. But people don't have to be so rude it would have been far better to just explain the post.

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