Subcutaneous SQ Injection in Buttocks?

[jdsp87]

I work in an Adult Day Care and routinely administer IM Vitamin B12 shots in the buttocks (dorsogluteal). I know it is not the best injection site but the patients say it's the least painful site and will actually refuse it if not there.

We recently had a doctor specifically order a subcutaneous SQ vitamin B12 shot for a patient. We did the upper arm and the abdomen and the patient hated it. She wants the shot in the buttocks and refuses it if it's not there. I've researched online and half the websites say the dorsogluteal is only for IM while others say it's ok to give SQ there. Does anyone have a nursing fundamentals book handy and tell me if a SQ injection in the buttocks is appropriate? Hehe

[fromtheseaRN, BSN, RN]

my book lists the upper dorsogluteal site as an alternative site to the standard (arm, abd, etc).

[MissJulie]

My Potter and Perry book reads that an alternative site for subcut can be the upper ventral or dorsal gluteal areas.

[tyvin, BSN, RN]

Are her values diminished somehow recently since receiving the med in the Buttocks? What is the physiology behind "not" giving it there? I really can't see why not if her values are the same as they would be if she receives it elsewhere.

This would be a great research theme for a paper similar to the Heparin controversy about administration of that drug which anyone who knows about it knows it threw out years of entrenched dogma.

Check her values, look at the history, and then challenge the doc as to why not or anyway that's what I would do.

[leslie :-D]

i've squeezed a few adipose layers on the buttocks, in my time...

and went in at an angle.

if you know what you're doing and where you're going, it shouldn't be an issue.

leslie

[MsbossyRN]

Not sure why that would be an issue, its sub Q. There is usually loads of fatty tissue in that area. :)