Strange places to draw blood from!

[allenmob]

Phlebotomist couldn't draw blood from a lady and asked me to. After 2 unsuccessful sticks I was about to give up when she said she had a great vein in her boob that a nurse in another hospital had started an IV in before. I refused to do that but she insisted. She even talked me into putting a tournequet around it. Was extremely embarrassed but did it, something I've never done in 28 years of nursing. (and will never do again!)

[caroladybelle, BSN, RN]

I had a IBD patient that frequently IVs sited on the breast. They could no longer place central lines due to clotting issues.

My favorite was having to do Q.30 minute accuchecks on a patient with no hands or feet - very unstable DM.

[TiffyRN, BSN, PhD]

I Have had issues with patients with few limbs or very poor perfusion that required creativity to obtain blood sugars. I once had to so an accucheck on a lady's earlobe. It was due to her severe vasoconstriction from dopamine drip. I would have skipped it if I had known she was going to pass away an hour later (elderly massive hemorrhagic CVA).

I work with infants now and we routinely prick their heels. But we had an infant born with no lower legs/feet. He had to have fingersticks for blood sugars. This was challenging on those tiny fingers. Any significant labs and he had to have arterial or venous sticks.

I started an IV on a man's chest wall one time, just a surface vein. I have seen in the NICU blood cultures drawn from the temporal artery on the side of the head (pretty unusual though and usually a last choice).

[Antikigirl, ASN, RN]

My husband told me about a sad case where this one young boy with severe CP was constantly in the hospital where he was working (he was a corpman in the navy). After years of IV sticks, he had no typical areas left to stick...so they went for different spots and most turned out bad.

One did work, and worked quite well...but gives me the shivers thinking about it...it was...bace of genital . I thought he was kidding me in a sick joke, but he wasn't! Poor kiddo...cards weren't dealt very good for him all around.

I guess any vein in the storm sometimes...but WOW, that would not be a fun IV to place.

[rjflyn, ASN, RN]

We once resusitated a patient using an IV established in a vein running across the ladies breast. In certain instances one takes what one can get. Routinely no this is not a place one who look.

For what it's worth I took care of an IV drug abuser who was injecting in those same vessels.

Rj