tnelso150

Hey everyone, New ICU nurse here. I had a patient come out of the OR today that coded on the table (she was in for a new aortic valve and the procedure was done through the groin) and was on 0.1 of epi and some levo. Her first ABG came back as a metabolic acidosis...and my charge nurse told me that epi causes patients to become acidotic. Can anyone explain the patho/pharm behind that? I tried looking it up to no avail...also in general (a question I should probably know the answer to already) why does a person become more acidotic after fluid loss? Thanks for your help :)

Thanks for all of the responses! I know you can never be "over prepared" in these kinds of situations :)

I'm a still very new nurse (just over one year) and have been working in a CTSICU for a little over half of my short nursing career. I like asking hypothetical questions that could very easily happen and one just occurred to me...it might be a really weird/stupid one or maybe has been asked already, but what would you do if your patient coded in a chair? Our surgeons like the patients up and sitting in an arm chair we keep in the room by POD1...so what would I do if my patient suddenly threw a PE or just went into v-tach or something? My initial reaction would be to pull them onto the floor (probably ripping out art lines/PA catheters in the process) to start CPR immediately. But have also thought that maybe it would be best to scream for help and wait for someone to come help me pull them to bed. The problem is a lot of these patients are big people (as you probably all already have experienced) and sometimes it can take a good three to four nurses to even help them stand up, let alone pick them up and move them somewhere...so my question for you: what would you do? Thanks for responding!