Pca Key

[barbyann]

I was asked this weekend to pick up my PCA key! They are handing them out to each nurse rather than locking one in pyxis. I refused initially and am in contact with risk management for advice.

I am wondering, how many of you carry your own PCA key? I was the only one who refused (afraid of liability), my co-workers gladly took the key and placed it on their badge holders. Am I overreacting?

[abundantjoy07, RN]

Our PCA key is kept with the charge nurse. They hand them over to one another when shifts change.

All of the nurses have keys to patient lockboxes outside the rooms which often has medication in it. So having that key is just as risky as having any other key.

If I was given the PCA key to keep with me, I'd guard it just as closely as I do the other key I have.

It's just another responsibility to have, and to be honest, it would be easier for me to have access when I needed it, as opposed to hunting down the charge nurse for the key.

I would have taken the PCA key, put it on my badge and that would have been that.

[Dolce, RN]

I would have taken the key and guarded it carefully just as I always do when I have it.

[SillyStudent, ASN, RN]

We take ours out of a pocket in the Pyxis and return it when we are done. There is one key on our floor.

[clee1]

There is one per unit in my hospital, in each med room, and opening a PCA is a two-nurse job, like checking off blood or verifying insulin.

[miko014]

I wouldn't want my own - we use them more than a lot of floors, but still not that often. It would just be one more thing to keep track of, and I don't want anything else on my badge. We have 4 on our unit - 2 in each pyxis - and I'm very happy to have it that way!

[JadedCPN, BSN, RN]

Like others said, we keep just one in the pyxis on each unit, and that works out just fine. On the unit I'm currently on, and even when I worked in the PICU, it's not like we had tons of patients on PCAs so you could usually find the PCA key in the pyxis when you needed it, and if not then you knew which nurse had it. I wouldn't want that responsibility of holding on to the key.

[Nursebarebari]

It does not make sence to me for every nurse to have a PCA key. I trust my co-workers but not enough when when it comes to narcotics. What if there is a nurse with drug problem, how I'm I sure that she will not tamper with my patient's drugs. H'mm, I will rather prefer only one key in the pyxis as we do. I will discuss this with my union, it is not safe for my license.

[mom4josh]

We solved this problem where I work... we now have a combination lock instead of a key lock on our PCA.

But I would have taken the key had it been offered. They would not be able to do that where I work though because of all the float nurses.

[queenjean]

We all have our own PCA key. Just like we have our own key to the med drawers.

Eh, I don't see what the big deal is. Our PCA doses are monitored every four hours, any change has to be co-witnessed, and wastes need to be co-wasted. Any discrepancy (like, if the PCA says there should be 10 cc to waste and there is only 5) goes to our clinical nurse specialist for monitoring.

We used to have to pull the key out of the pyxis, but people didn't always return them immediately so you would have to hunt them down (who has the pyxis key?), and it was a pain to have to run back all the way to the end of the hall (where the med pyxis is, poor design, yes) to grab the key to make a change or add more time, etc. It was simply a waste of time. When we floated to the surgical floor, we would have to chase down another nurse, because they all carry their own and therefore don't have one in the pyxis.

I would be insulted if the hospital thought I was untrustworthy enough to not carry my own key. If someone is going to steal narcs, what is going to stop them from pulling the key from the pyxis pocket or asking the charge nurse for it and then doing it then? If you have an untrustworthy nurse who is stealing narcs, she's going to do it with or without her own personal PCA key.

[Lorie P.]

I have my own PCA key on the ring with my badge, locker ley and sharps'/med cart key. No biggie, I was offered one and took it. Many times too much time was wasted having to hunt down the charge nurse for the key, someone took it out of the pyxis and didn't return it.

So yes I like having my own.

[NN03]

I carry my own PCA key on the same ring as my draw and needle box keys, we use PCA's quite frequently on my floor, it's really not a big deal.... the machines have history logs on them . If you can trust your coworkers then maybe you would want to think about changing workplaces. Just need to be aware of where you keep your keys.