Precepting in IV therapy

Hello!

I am about to enter my final semester of nursing school (YAY!) and I just received part of my precepting placement, which will be in IV therapy. I want to prepare myself before I start my preceptorship, and I was told that I will be starting many IV's and helping manage PICC and Central lines. I've never even learned to start an IV yet, but aside from that skill, I'm wondering what kinds of concepts I should review before I start? And what is a typical day like as an IV/infusion nurse? I'm sure it varies for everyone, but I would like to get an idea.

Thank you!

Well YAY for you! Congrats... AND

1. IV therapy is a very exciting and ever changing as a nursing career.

2. Brush up on your Sterile technique as this will be mandatory when changing dressings and with port accessing.

3. Remember over and over.. SCRUB the hub of your needleless connector. Each AND EVERY time!

4. Make only two attempts to place the line. No more as you've increased your stress and the patients.

5. Always place the best IV catheter for the patient. ( Taking into account what medication that they will be receiving and what vessels are palpable and what is the length of therapy)

Check out You Tube for TONS of IV insertion demos, PICC management techniques and central line dressings. You will be surprised by how informative they can be. Many of them are produced by nursing schools.

Check out You Tube for TONS of IV insertion demos, PICC management techniques and central line dressings. You will be surprised by how informative they can be. Many of them are produced by nursing schools.

Youtube is a terrible place to find proper ways of performing IVT.

There was a time I would agree with you IVRUS. But for the purposes of having a "looksee" for a student who won't be doing many Central Line dressings or seeing PICC insertions for a while, it's really not such a bad idea to just see what might be involved. In fact, several of the instructional videos that were shown at a recent hospital vascular access workshop turned up on you tube. Of course this doesn't take the place of hands-on instruction or P&P, and nor did I insinuate that. Also ,many nursing schools upload their instructional videos as well for anyone curious about a procedure. I have 3 daughters in 3 different nursing programs around the east coast and they have all been directed to You Tube among other places to see examples of many procedures.