question about anti-embolitic pumps

[Purple Princess]

I had been an RN student last semester. I will be attending an LPN school in the spring, long story... Anyway, I had a patient during clinical one week that was on bedrest rt hip surgery and so they had those AE boots on her calves with a pump continuously circulating air to prevent clots and promote circulation. My main question is all of a sudden this pump began to beep and it said HI in the box. I began to loosen the boots on her legs and asked her if they were getting too tight she said no. My partner went and shut the pump off. I told the nurse in which she seemed to care less and never came to check on the problem. My instructors scolded me and told me I should thank my partner. But why don't they tell us how to use some of this equipment before clinical? We didn't know much about the pumps, how to do accu checks but oh boy they seem to love giving out those remedial forms to us.

[Tweety, BSN, RN]

Gee, if you would have shut it off then you would have got scolded "how dare you turn off equipment without knowing what is wrong".

Turning it off without trouble shooting isn't fixing the problem and in theory is putting your patient at risk for DVTs.

Good luck in school!