No time for gloves??

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I have a question? I'm entering nursing school in spring '08 so maybe I'm naive about things. A woman that is in LPN school, who has been an EMT for 15 years, told me that I was being naive believing there is always an opportunity to use gloves while treating patients. She told me that stuff like that in hospitals during trauma situations only happened in the movies. Frankly, I didn't believe her so I asked someone else that I know...a woman that has been an RN for 20 years in the ICU field. This woman agreed that gloves and PPEs were not always an option. Any thoughts??

:confused:

If your skin is intact the safety issue is incredibly small. Would I do it all the time? Of course not and I never said so. But there are situations in which you have to make a choice. In my own situation, do you really think it would have been safer to let a premature baby fall on the floor while I crabbed gloves? I'm 100% okay with my decision. My hands got yucky. That's it. Whoopdeedoo.

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Specializes in ED.
They are fools. I hate to say it, but if I had the choice between getting HIV and not getting HIV, just to save someone's life, I'd probably rather lose my license than forgo the PPE. Anyone who says PPE is not an option is a fool.

I work in the ER, and there are truly sometimes that you have to react not only to mabey stop bleeding (even then there is normally time to allow doning gloves) but if a patient is turning violent on you or another staff member, are you going to protect yourself and grab to restrain him? Or are you going to look for gloves? Things like this do happen, thankfully not often.

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Specializes in Emergency & Trauma/Adult ICU.

This seems overblown.

Would I catch a falling baby without gloves? Of course.

And no, I can't don gloves if I am currently wrestling with a combative patient.

Other than that ... there's time.

The outcome of patients who are bleeding out depends on factors other than the 2 seconds it takes to put gloves on.

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Specializes in ER, ICU cath lab, remote med.

I have 12 years of experience including EMT/ER/remote medicine/Critical Care. I cannot recall a single experience where I was unable to glove up. But maybe I'm just lucky :D.

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This seems overblown.

Would I catch a falling baby without gloves? Of course.

And no, I can't don gloves if I am currently wrestling with a combative patient.

Other than that ... there's time.

The outcome of patients who are bleeding out depends on factors other than the 2 seconds it takes to put gloves on.

But that's exactly the point. It's rare, but it happens. When it happens, you make a choice.

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Specializes in Emergency & Trauma/Adult ICU.
But that's exactly the point. It's rare, but it happens. When it happens, you make a choice.

OP's point, as I understand it, was that she was getting the impression that this circumstance happens "more often than you think."

It seems that is not the experience of posters here.

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The people mentioned by the OP said there was not always time for gloves. The term "more often than you would think" came far later.

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Specializes in Emergency.
The people mentioned by the OP said there was not always time for gloves. The term "more often than you would think" came far later.

I think the correct idea to come across is that there may not always be time to put on gloves. But one should always, always attempt to if they can.

And I will concur with unless someone is pumping out from an aorta, shunt, femoral, radial or other large artery the 2 seconds you take to put on gloves is not going to matter. In the CPR example sorry they are technically dead, I am putting on gloves first.

Rj

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That's more than fair. I would hope no one is promoting not using gloves when they have the option. I've seen weirder things though, so who knows.

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Specializes in Emergency.

Hey, I'm a student and I'm going to ask questions. I may be older but I'm learning. When I was told this it was put to me "stuff like that only happens in the movies." You bet a baby would never, ever hit the floor with me around. I don't mean to upset anyone but I don't apologize for asking questions either....that's part of why we are here right?

What started this discussion was my CNA teacher talking about her situation. She said she and another nurse charged into a situation without gloves to "help out" with a guy that was bleeding badly....turned out he was HIV positive and she said that was the worst time of her life! My teacher said, never...ever...ever let it happen to us!

Thanks so much to everone for listening and answering!!

:tku:

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Specializes in med/surg/tele/neuro/rehab/corrections.

Thank you for your story Ocelot. It generated a great discussion.

I only worked in ER for 6 months but there was never a time when we couldn't reach for a pair of gloves. But gloves were not only in all the rooms there were three boxes of gloves outside every room in holders on the wall, so gloves were everywhere. And the first piece of advice I got was to stick a pair in my pocket. :)

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i work in dialysis too. which is why i always keep gloves at every work station. and even though we aren't suppose to keep gloves in our pockets, usually after i pull a needle i reglove again with clean gloves, and try to stay in the area. there have been times when a pt is gushing out and i don't have time to glove up i will take the gauze and cover the site with the glove (without touching any blood) and the result will be the pt holding the gauze and glove until i can glove up or get help. we have HIV pt's to which is how i explain the numerous boxes of gloves nearby, but so far i have never handled blood barehanded and will try to use anything else besides my hands, because it is just to risky.

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