IV bag mistake

Trauma Columnist · Jul 11, 2013

Don't sweat....I did the same thing on a night shift with D5w which is dextrose or sugar water....lol. What,a sticky mess.....

Esme12, ASN, BSN, RN · Jul 11, 2013

I've done it with blood AND a TPN bag....(50% Dextrose) talk about a sticky mess!

((HUGS)) it happens....:)

weirdscience · Jul 11, 2013

I did it in school during lab! Don't feel too bad. It happens.

krazievi3t6url · Jul 11, 2013

hehe it happens! No worries! I did it to but it was just saline and in front of a patient!

I've gotten dextrose on my scrub top too. Embarrassing stain that I had to explain. LOL!

nurseprnRN, BSN, RN · Jul 12, 2013

Humans. Aren't they something? We robots never make mistakes or spill stuff or get stains on our polycarbonate shells.

psu_213, BSN, RN · Jul 12, 2013

At my former job, we got these new "bags" for IV ABX. It was basically thick foil on one side, other other side was see through plastic. The "bag" (I'm using " because I'm not even sure it qualifies as a bag) was divided into 3 parts where the plastic was attached to the foil part. The upper compartment had fluid (NS, D5, etc), the middle part had the ABX powder, and lower part was empty and that was where the spike was to go. Well, you folded the bag on itself to break seal #1 so the fluid mixed with the powder to reconstitute the med. Then fold the bag again to break the other seal so that the med/liquid went down the spike point...you then spike it and yadda, yadda, yadda to administer your med.

Well, another nurse I was working with had not been there for the inservice on how this worked. She spiked the bag, but when no fluid came out she was lost. She 'unspiked' the bag and called me in the room to help her (since the fluid was no "released" from the first chamber of the bag, it was not able to rush out from the spike port). At this point I did not realize she spiked/unspiked the bag. So I say to her "oh, its really easy--just like this." I fold the bag, break seal 1 and the NS mixes with the powdered med. I then break seal 2 to get the fluid down the the spike part. Well, since the "spike seal" (I know, real technical terms here) was already broken, when I folded the bag and broke the last seal in the bag, the fluid/med comes shooting out of the spike port. Of course I had it pointing right at the patient, so they got a nice bath of room temp Ancef. I apologized profusely and stayed out of that room for the rest of the night! Point is, we have all done something similar to what your describe in the OP. Just be glad you didn't do it all over a patient.

P.S., I'm sure my description of the ABX bag was confusing, so check out a picture of it: http://images.medscape.com/pi/features/drugdirectory/octupdate/BRN31030.jpg

The part at the top of the bag with the drug label on it is the NS. Below the label you can see the seal. The next part below the seal is the powder. You see another seal. Below that is the chamber for your spike.

green34 · Jul 12, 2013

It happens. Wait till you go through the bag when spiking them. It looked like I peed my pants.

jjon · Jul 13, 2013

Oh man, do I love this site!

Thank you all for your responses! At the time it felt like the end of the world, but I feel A LOT better now :)

akulahawkRN, ADN, RN, EMT-P · Jul 13, 2013

While I've not done that particular deed recently, I have done that back when I first started spiking IV bags... in 2000 or so in Paramedic School. Thankfully, it was just NS and not D5... but I can honestly say that 1 liter of NS makes for a pretty decent cleanup effort. Lots of towels and a mop finally got that fluid up. I would have really dreaded cleaning the mess up had it been D5.

Point is that we all do stuff like this from time to time. To this day, I am VERY careful about unspiking IV bags.