I'm fairly new to taking care of babies, so sometimes I'm still not sure of myself. I took care of a baby last night, it was his last night with us, so I was getting his PKU screen and did a bili because he was a little jaundiced. The results came back at 14.2, but at the time of the test the baby was 62 hours old (c-section mom, staying 3 days). According to our chart in the nursery that's still in the "watch infant, repeat if necessary stage". And I also drew the lab around midnight, so it was 1:30am when I got the results. I decided that there was no need to notifiy the MD at the time of the day with those results. When I gave report in the morning, the nurse I gave report to said things that made me really doubt this decision to not report it. Would you have called the MD for this? I've been poking around tonight online to try to find more references regarding phototherapy and bili levels, and the only thing I've found states that for an infant 49-72 hours, start phototherapy at 15 and above. So I feel like I made the right choice to not call, but I'm still doubtful. Help?
If you are unsure about borderline results, you can always call it just before going off shift, also. (I've even waited until giving report and offered to my replacement, "would you like me to call this to the doc before I leave?") This way you make sure the doc gets notified at a nicer hour and don't leave it for days (unless they agree it can wait) - goodness knows the first few hours of their shift is usually organized chaos!
33-weeker
412 Posts
If you are unsure about borderline results, you can always call it just before going off shift, also. (I've even waited until giving report and offered to my replacement, "would you like me to call this to the doc before I leave?") This way you make sure the doc gets notified at a nicer hour and don't leave it for days (unless they agree it can wait) - goodness knows the first few hours of their shift is usually organized chaos!