Specialties NICU
Published Jul 26, 2003
VickyRN, MSN, DNP, RN
49 Articles; 5,349 Posts
Can you tell me a little more about VIA and continuous assessment of arterial blood gases? What does VIA stand for? What are the risks? Would you recommend this? Thank you!
dawngloves, BSN, RN
2,399 Posts
Gee. I'd like to know too! :imbar
nicudaynurse
150 Posts
I've never heard of it either!
NicuGal, MSN, RN
2,743 Posts
I'm not sure what it stands for, but it is hooked up to our art lines/Uacs and RT uses it to draw the gases. No blood is taken out, it goes to a sensor and reads the gas, lytes and glucose, then it automatically flushes it back. No blood out :) Once a day they have to send labs to the regular lab to make sure it is calibrated right, but we just do this with our daily labs.
It is actually kinda of a pain to use because for some reason the tubing is super short and the sensor can't be in a humidified bed, so the baby is almost to the end of the bed so that the lines don't pull out! It is a good idea with a flawed design. LOL There are really no risks involved, just the usual of having an art line. :)
Thank you for the info!