Scary Story

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Specializes in ICU.

Holy smokes. Last night, we got a pt back from the OR. He had multiple gunshot wounds to chest and abdomen. We'd had him for 1.5 weeks, not looking too good and starting to develop ARDS. When the OR team wheeled him in, his arterial pressure was in the 60s, O2 sats also in the 60s, HR 140s. They were using a portable vent which ended up on my side of the bed. The RT switched him to the vent and immediately his sats started increasing. I was a little suspicious and checked the gauge on O2 tank they were using to see if it was full and discovered that it wasn't even turned on. :eek: The RT was pretty new, but he had 3 nurses and an anesthesiologist with him as well and someone should have checked it, for goodness sake. It was a big reminder that seemingly small mistakes can end up being life-or-death mistakes.

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You're right... sometimes it's the (seemingly) little things.

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Specializes in CTICU.

Hope that was an incident report!

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Specializes in Post Anesthesia.

That's why when you do your "mega code" in ACLS almost always you will have an O2 tank run dry or a tubing pop off causing profound hypoxia and its related problems.. Checking the little things is a great way to avoid the big things. Be thankful you know this but I don't no if it is worth making a big deal out of it. Mention it to the RT the next time you admit a patient with them-(I assume you already made them aware of the O2tank)"Isn't it amazing how much better patients saturate when thier O2 is turned on"

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Specializes in tele,step down, micu.

I had an rt hook the vent up to the yellow air outlet, becuase there was a green gauge on it. I noticed that the pt sats were dropping like a rock. The rt was grateful that it was caught quickly. As we said before mistakes do happen. Always check everything if the sats are down and they are vetned. Something could be disconnected.

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In my L & D rotation, a c-section baby was delivered and brought over to have apgars checked, and was found cyanotic and listless-then the Rn's discovered that the flowmeter was off the whole time.

Eliza

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Yes thats happened to me I was so angry...with myself and them.

I was transfering a patient in an ambulence to London about 60 miles, and the paramedics always got shirty with me because I would insist on checking their equipment, they would say I've checked it to which I would reply, yes I know you have but I am the one with the registration to lose... anyway on this day I checked the O2 and realised to gauge wasn't working, I pointed it out and the paramedic said yes we know but that was a new cylinder today, I said I wanted it changed he huffed about and said that that would mean a delay of an hour while he went to his station, my patient was in a bad way and it was only because our air ambulence had crashed a week before that he wasn't going in that (crew killed), so I said okay fine because I have great respect for paramedics and believe that they are true professionals also (and I still do dispite this story). we got 50 miles from London I realise Pt is deteriorating, sats first, scream at crew to stop and pull over jr doc with me says "what do we do?" I shout back "sorry mate but that isn't that why you are here!!!" give him the bag and I start suction this is when I realise NO O2 fortunately for me, the patient, doctor and crew I always used to pack a mini bottle in my transfer pack, which until that point I always thought I was being a little paranoid about, and crews used to say oh just leave that behind rather than lugging it...anyway we made it I got them to radio ahead and we meet up with another crew onroute, who gave us another bottle of O2... incident forms done...moral even when you are a picky pain in the a&&^ like me things still go wrong because we make a decision based on the wrong criteria!!

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Specializes in MICU/SICU.
Yes thats happened to me I was so angry...with myself and them.

I was transfering a patient in an ambulence to London about 60 miles, and the paramedics always got shirty with me because I would insist on checking their equipment, they would say I've checked it to which I would reply, yes I know you have but I am the one with the registration to lose... anyway on this day I checked the O2 and realised to gauge wasn't working, I pointed it out and the paramedic said yes we know but that was a new cylinder today, I said I wanted it changed he huffed about and said that that would mean a delay of an hour while he went to his station, my patient was in a bad way and it was only because our air ambulence had crashed a week before that he wasn't going in that (crew killed), so I said okay fine because I have great respect for paramedics and believe that they are true professionals also (and I still do dispite this story). we got 50 miles from London I realise Pt is deteriorating, sats first, scream at crew to stop and pull over jr doc with me says "what do we do?" I shout back "sorry mate but that isn't that why you are here!!!" give him the bag and I start suction this is when I realise NO O2 fortunately for me, the patient, doctor and crew I always used to pack a mini bottle in my transfer pack, which until that point I always thought I was being a little paranoid about, and crews used to say oh just leave that behind rather than lugging it...anyway we made it I got them to radio ahead and we meet up with another crew onroute, who gave us another bottle of O2... incident forms done...moral even when you are a picky pain in the a&&^ like me things still go wrong because we make a decision based on the wrong criteria!!

cool story

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Specializes in CCRN-CMC-CSC: CTICU, MICU, SICU, TRAUMA.

Very scary... I ran to a rapid response on a telemetry unit a few months ago... BIPAP mask was on without the machine on... suffocating the patient... can you imagine?

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Very scary... I ran to a rapid response on a telemetry unit a few months ago... BIPAP mask was on without the machine on... suffocating the patient... can you imagine?

Newer masks have a safety valve now, thank god. Also, that is why many hospitals require anyone using bipap(whether for severe OSA or for ventilation) to be on an alarmed ventilator.

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Specializes in MICU/SICU.

TOTALLY scary! Time for some REALLY specific, "defensive" documentation on that one!

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Specializes in critical care.

We got a RAT call the other day for resp failure-turns out was hooked up to BiPap but the BiPap tubing wasn't connected to BiPap. RAT team found it......

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