greenterra

Latest Activity

1. Nurse's Discretion Dilemma

   greenterra replied to BizzieRN's topic in Safety

   Hi BizzieRN! It sounds to me like you are a great patient advocate. Your Doc sounds like his priorities are not screwed on quite right-- a minor setback in whatever research is being done is definitely a reasonable cost to pay to avoid serious harm t...

2. Infection control problems using single use vials?

   greenterra replied to greenterra's topic in Safety

   Thanks for doing the research, 3rdCareerRN! Especially thank you for including citations, although they muddy the water a bit. For instance, although the first article concludes that disinfection isn't needed, in the body of the abstract it states "O...

3. Pre-filled saline syringes and checking central line blood return

   greenterra replied to greenterra's topic in Safety

   Yes, in an ideal world nurses would be able to maintain aseptic technique in the midst of poo. As a final note, some facilities do prohibit aspiration using pre-filled flushes, though it isn't clear whether aspiration is OK if there is some injection...

4. Pre-filled saline syringes and checking central line blood return

   greenterra replied to greenterra's topic in Safety

   Well, if you are aspirating to verify the central line is correctly placed, you are bringing the sterile saline in the syringe back over an area of the barrel interior which was just below the non-sterile plunger, and been next to the non-sterile end...

5. Pre-filled saline syringes and checking central line blood return

   greenterra replied to greenterra's topic in Safety

   Thanks for all the information in your posts, lpnflorida! Additionally, I've looked around the internet some more. It looks like many nurses are OK with using prefilled syringes to aspirate, and (if syringed is immediately relabeled) to dilute meds, ...

6. Infection control problems using single use vials?

   greenterra replied to greenterra's topic in Safety

   Actually, I've been searching the manufacturer's site to get their recommendation, and I can't find anything. I couldn't even find any mention of single use NS vials on Hospira's site.

7. Pre-filled saline syringes and checking central line blood return

   greenterra replied to greenterra's topic in Safety

   Yes, it's true we're not talking about pulling blood into the syringe. The question is whether microbes would "fall off" the plunger and contaminate the barrel when you push, and then contaminate the saline when you pull back to check blood return. P...

8. Pre-filled saline syringes and checking central line blood return

   greenterra posted a topic in Safety

   Elsewhere on allnurses.com, a poster pointed out that one of the reasons why nurses shouldn't use prefilled normal saline syringes for diluting IV medications was that, in many cases, only the saline and interior of the syringe is sterile-- if the pl...

9. Infection control problems using single use vials?

   greenterra posted a topic in Safety

   During orientation for my hospital system's, the IV nurse educator said that the single use vials of normal saline we use are manufactured with porous plastic caps, so after breaking off the plastic cap, we should swab them with alcohol. I work in an...

10. Droplet oozing from subcutaneous administration?

    greenterra replied to greenterra's topic in New Nurse

    Thanks so much for the help. I will definitely count to 3 after giving insulin. Regarding the lovenex, my hospital's policy is to only give it in the love handles, not in the anterior abdomen around (but away from) the umbilicus. The nursing manageme...

11. Droplet oozing from subcutaneous administration?

    greenterra posted a topic in New Nurse

    Hi all! I am in my first month of nursing. This week I was giving a subQ insulin-R shot (8 units) and when I withdrew the needle, a droplet of insulin came out with it. I wondered if I got the insulin in the wrong type of tissue (I pinched skin behin...

12. New PhD Student

    greenterra replied to dianacs's topic in Post Graduate

    Thanks for the replies! At least some of the time I'd like to remain by the bedside. Infection control interests me, too... I need to try to collect my thoughts and determine long term goals. The one thing I know is that I miss learning, and thinking...

13. New PhD Student

    greenterra replied to dianacs's topic in Post Graduate

    Hi Guys! Congratulations on entering PhD programs! I am hoping you won't mind answering a question: do you know if a PhD can help a clinical nurse's career goals? Or is a PhD solely for nurse educators and researchers? Of course, I know about DNP pr...

14. Air Embolism

    greenterra replied to Nellie Nurse's topic in Infusion

    Also take a look at the allnurses air_embolism_iv_therapy thread: https://allnurses.com/forums/f27/air-embolism-iv-therapy-96687.html, it has a references that explicitly talks about how much is too much air, and mechanisms of complications.

15. Lower % of passing students on newer NCLEX?

    greenterra replied to greenterra's topic in NCLEX

    Thanks, Suzane4 and IIG . Yes, I hope that the evidence for the cause of poorer NCLEX performance after a delay is not simply because one is losing the information one has crammed. However, the concern being brought up in KY is that the pass rate ha...