Practical scrub color in Dialysis...

Specialties Urology

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I am a New Grad. starting in dialysis soon. My clinic does not have a set color scheme for scrub colors, and I am thinking of buying a bunch of black scrubs for ease of washing. Is this practical? I read somewhere that bleach splatters are a possibility (inevitability?) in dialysis work. Any advice before I spend a load of $ on scrubs? Thanks so much!

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Specializes in Med/Surg, Tele, Dialysis, Hospice.

I wouldn't go with black.

Bleach spills? It depends on what your job duties entail. I have a few bleach stains on my scrubs from when I worked acute dialysis and had to bleach machines in the hospitals, but working in a chronic, outpatient clinic, at least for Fresenius, the techs do the bleaching so I never work with bleach anymore. I'm assuming that you won't be working for Fresenius, because they provide scrubs for you, so your clinic may have RNs bleaching, I would have no idea.

Back to the black, though, no, I wouldn't do it. Black can be a very depressing color and a lot of chronic renal patients are already depressed. It may not seem like a big deal to a young, healthy person, but bright colors or soft pastels do affect the patients in a positive way, because some of them have mentioned this to me. Also, black tends to fade over time and show up every little speck or thread that you get on you over the course of the day. And of course, back to the bleach...well, you know what bleach does to black, if you do end up being exposed to it.

Fresenius provides us with ceil blue, navy, or egglant (sort of a burgundy/purple shade) solid tops and bottoms and a variety of patterned tops that incorporate those colors if we want to wear them with the solid pants. I REALLY appreciate that I no longer have to buy scrubs for work! Yay, Fresenius! :)

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I had not thought of the effect of black colors on depressed patients! Also, I'm not sure if I'll be bleaching machines or not either. :) Thank you so much for your insight! Being a newbie, I want to be able to put the patients at ease as much as possible so I will take your advice and go a more cheerful route! :)

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Specializes in Dialysis.

Light colored CHEAP scrubs to begin with, because you will be exposed to bleach, esp. in a chronic unit. At my clinic the nurses bleach the machines and the bicarb delivery system. You don't want to toss a set of $40 scrubs the first week!

Good luck, I hope you love dialysis as much as I do!

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As an RN in dialysis, there have been times I need to do bleach, and yes you do get spattered with bleach at times. For me it usually ends up at the bottom of my pant legs. It always seemed to happen when I was wearing new scrubs too! Since bleaching is usually scheduled for a certain day of the week, I just make sure on those days I wear white pants. No big deal getting bleach splatters then.

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I'd wear whatever makes you happy and COMFORTABLE! I have unusual coloring and my patients always compliment me when I wear black or bright red. Scrubs are cheap and even with all the bleach I still stay within my budget on work clothing. 90% of the time I'm wearing PPE gowns and stuff so I could be naked and it wouldn't matter. I'm always cold and I've found a company that makes really nice scrubs with 3/4 length sleeves which helps.

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Nurses wear blue at my hospital and I have bleach on almost every pair. I used to be a very stylish nurse before I went in to dialysis. I used to wear white pants on bleach days

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I wear black, grey, and dark colors because honestly, they look cool. No patient has yet to complain of my scrubs being depressing because 1) im wearing PPE like 80% of the time so all they see is white anyway and 2) its all about your attitude. If you have a good attitude and are wearing black, i doubt patients will get depressed from the color. as other people have said though, the bleach drops do suck and my black pants got some nice faded pink spots on it but whatever, dialysis nurse trademark right?

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On black pants with bleach spots, you can carefully dab a little black acrylic craft paint on small spots. The paint doesn't wash out.

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Specializes in ER, TRAUMA, MED-SURG.
On black pants with bleach spots, you can carefully dab a little black acrylic craft paint on small spots. The paint doesn't wash out.

Right - I've had to do this a few times too and it worked really well.

Anne, RNC

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