Please stop! Little things that are just bad practice.

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Little things that are just bad practice.

Like looping IV tubing back into itself (against our policy, and they went to great lengths to hand out caps to carry in pockets). And not even cleaning off the port you looped it into!

Disconnecting a running IV to take a pt to the bathroom.. and just leaving the bare end hanging from the pole. Don't interrupt IVFs ! Take the blinking pump with you!

What are yours?

Specializes in Acute Care Pediatrics.
By this standard no line would ever last 4 days.

It's not a "standard" - it's a policy. **shrug**

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Specializes in Oncology.
Ignoring the date on IV tubing.

If you hang fluids, and then they disconnect for any reason... May it be bathroom, shower, PT... They are no longer "continuous". Your line now is now good for 24 hours vs. 96.

We're obsessive about changing IV tubing on schedule on my unit. It's passed off on report sheets when it's from and night shift is responsible for changing it the day it's due with AM blood draw. I did OT on another unit and asked the nurse reporting to me when it was from. She had no idea and it wasn't dated. I asked what time tubing changes were done. Again, crickets.

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Specializes in Med Surg, Parish Nurse, Hospice.

I agree with almost everything posted. But one of my biggest pet peeves (and I have quite a few), is the IV tubing doubled back on itself. I would throw away the tubing and get new to come back the next day to the same thing. I also didn't like it when pts want their IV fluids stopped to go to the bathroom. I would go into the room to talk with them and get the response, "all the other nurses do it". I would often say that I am not all the other nurses and I didn't feel comfortable doing that. At some places that I worked, IV fluids were disconnected to take the pt off the unit for Xray etc. If the pt was gone for any length of time, that could be a significant loss of IV fluids. But then again, I am old school and learned to do things a certain way, not the way things are done today.

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Its not allowed where I work, its considered bad practice, I believe it has to do with JACHO. I just know admin is adamant that we not longer do that, but use alcohol laced caps instead. They come on strips that can be hung from the IV stand so they will always be available to everyone.

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We had a patient who would steal the unused rolls of toilet paper from our bathrooms. They caught said patient on camera going into several bathrooms each time they came in to be seen, and leaving with a large bag.. They had found a way to unlock the lock on the TP holder. They now only allow one roll per stall.. Only the cleaning people have access to the rest of the supply. You can't ever find one of them for more TP if you need it. If you are broke enough to have to steal our super cheap (it can barely be called TP) TP I say take it.. That's desperate.

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Specializes in Oncology.

Turning HR/RR/SpO2 alarms off rather than adjusting to find better parameters for the patient to avoid unnecessary alarming

Or figuring out why they're alarming- i.e., titrating oxygen up as needed, replacing ecg leads, or medicating the pain that is causing your patient to have a RR of 30. Also drives me nuts when the patient's normal HR is 110 and they have the alarm at 120, so every time you roll them they alarm. Or the people that disconnect all of the equipment to bathe the patient, and don't pause the monitor so it's alarming for their whole bath at the nurse's station.

Leaving the oncoming nurse with an empty IV bag

Or programming a new 1L bag as "900" ml's, so it is alarming empty when there's another 150 ml's in there. Those bags are overfilled by over 50 ml's. I program my 1L bags for 1050ml.

Not programming the pump by drug/fluid name and just setting everything for "basic infusion." Not having drips running with buretrols. Insisting that your patient on a vasopressin drip doesn't need cardiac monitoring because it wasn't ordered.

One for the physicians: Changing an IVF rate without discontinuing the old one, so it looks on my MAR like you want my patient having NS @ 100 and NS @ 42.

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Specializes in Oncology.
This is not medically related except for the fact that I have found nurse's particularly to be guilty of it repeatedly over the years: Not replacing the empty toilet paper roll on the spindle with a new roll. If I had a dollar for every time I have gone into the nurse's AND patient's bathrooms and found this to be the case, I would be driving a Rolls Royce right now! :eek:

Our toilet paper dispensers are locked, and they lock up the toilet paper so nurses can't get to it. To make matters worse, we don't have 24 hr housekeeping, so the day and evening shift aids need to steel and stash toilet paper incase we run out at night, then we can give them a new roll to lay on top of the dispenser. Many a time I've told patients they need to get by with barrier wipes and tissues until morning.

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Specializes in Oncology.
I have pts do this way more than other rns. Quite a few frequent fliers will shut off the fluid, disconnect the line and shuffle off to the bathroom leaving the open end dangling.

I try to teach them but as chico marx said "they no a listen".

Had a patient do this. She left everything running. I almost killed myself slipping in a puddle of TPN. Oddly, she died of sepsis.

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Specializes in Oncology.

Another one: ambulatory patients that want their CVL tubing coming out the arm pit of their shirt, then twice daily when they want to change needing it disconnected. I've had a few patients get really upset with me when I tell them they should be wearing the shirt over the tubing, because it's an infection risk to keep disconnecting it.

Other nurses not enforcing max visitor reals, then me looking like a her when I do.

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Specializes in Med nurse in med-surg., float, HH, and PDN.

How about leaving the stinky suction receptacle so full it slops over whenyou​ have to empty it. YECH!

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It's not a "standard" - it's a policy. **shrug**

That's fine, but realize it's not policy everywhere.

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What about the CNA who disconnects nasal oxygen to walk the pt to the BR?? I don't know how to make them understand that the pt needs the O2 especially when up and walking!!! Yes, empty TP rolls get to me also, why do they lock them and have the extra rolls of TP somewhere we cannot get to them?? Talk about public relations---dosen't it look bad when a facility does not have toilet paper??

Or pillows! I was once out of pillows and couldn't find any even on other units. I got an admit who didn't have a pillow for the back of their head for a couple of hours. I had to call someone to bring up new pillows. They seem to be hit or miss. Maybe people steal them or something.

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