So it happened today... Oh soo fast... I feel like such an idiot!
My patient's PICC line wasn't working so I was drawing her labs from her hand. I drew about 2cc and the blood quit coming. Thinking I needed to advance the needle some more I palpated the vein above the needle. As I went to advance some the patient jerked!!! The tip of the needle came up through her skin and poked my index finger.
I almost didn't report it but I knew I would regret it. So far her HIV is negative.. Still waiting on her Hep C. She is a low risk patient and I pray it will be negative. I have to go to "counseling" tomorrow.
oh tige i am so sorry. my first and only was from a surgeon irrigating a triple lumen (rns couldn't do it back then) he handed me the needle point first.
i can still feel it in my ring finger left hand. the patient was a lady of the evening, had gonorrhea, and probably some other stuff. this was before hiv had even been id'd.
he took me to the er himself and made sure i was tested and treated. the only problem was employee health wanted the charge me something like $400 for the hepatitis b stuff. i refused to pay. first nurse in a line of hundreds who got them free.
oh how times have changed. i am so sorry you had to go through this. but by all means report splashes, sticks, hits, touches everything you come across.
best wished clemson girl from a carolina girl.
you know just a thought: there are surgical gloves the orthos use they're thick as shoe leather in the fingers. wonder if you could talk your manager into a couple of boxes? i always wore them when doing those chest tubes trochars. i dont think you could push a needle through them.
I just had my first needle stick last night. I work in a rest home, so I gave the resident the preloaded insulin syringe, resident injected, capped the needle crookedly, so that it went through the cap, and one of my fingers was nicked as the resident handed the syringe back to me. I will now treat every syringe as a loaded gun and try never, ever, to handle one from the needle end, regardless. The resident is low risk and I'm not too worried. As it turns out the chances of becoming infected by HIV or any of the heps is surprisingly low. I got a good education at the hospital.
Katie5
1,459 Posts
I like this:)