silly but please help! :)

[sweetieann]

Ok this might sound extremely silly....but I need to ask it and I hope my question makes sense so that someone will answer! :) I've worked with IV's before in clinicals, but it's been a few months and I guess you really "lose it" if you don't use it! I'm a psych nurse now and haven't been dealing with IV's. From what I remember, when I did work with IV's in cliniclals, it was ALWAYS set up where the primary tubing just "screwed" on to the IV port hub (heplock/saline lock hub--if that makes sense). Plain and simple. Now I saw a pt with an IV at the psych hospital where I worked (they had a heplock because they get continue rehydration with IV) and you literally couldn't screw the primary tubing on. There wasn't a "screw" part connector. Instead, it kind of looked like a "y site" port-where there is a little yellowish gel type stuff in the hub. Now, there are blunt plastic cannulas that you can connect to the primary tubing and then "push" it through the hep lock port part that was exposed. Are these just different types of systems or what? It's ok to attach the blunt plastic cannula to the end of the tubing and "push" it through the part that's exposed correct? (isn't that wthat its made for, so it's needle-less?) I know those alligator clamp things have a plastic cannula inside the clip and those can be attached to that sort of hub....Sorry this is all over the place, I'm typing my stream of consciousness :) I guess my main question is, can I just attach a blunt plastic cannula onto the end of the primary IV tubing and connect it to the hub that way? Since it can't screw on.

THANKS!

[patwil73]

Yes. There are different types of primary tubing and you just come across the 2 main ones. The one you are seeing now just take the alligator clamp with the blunt plastic needle and push it through the yellow gel end.

I don't really like those types, but have seen them often.

Pat

[Daytonite, BSN, RN]

Yes, you can attach a blunt plastic cannula to the end of primary IV tubing. If I were you, I would take the time to pull and look at the various IVs and IV tubings your facility uses. Save the packages that they come in and read any instructions that might be on the packages, particularly the packages that the IV tubings come in. You can also sometimes go to the websites of the manufactures of these items to get more information about them.

[fultzymom]

There are many different types of IV connections. We had this specific type when I first started at my work. We have now went to the type that screws in like you had mentioned. We switch all the time depending on the vendor we are currently working with.

Leslie

[nyapa, RN]

We had the gel ones/alligator clips, and we also have progressed to totally needless screwtypes. I like the fact that both systems do not involve sharps.