Supra pubic and indwelling catheter

[NurseMari87]

I'm a brand new nurse and I was hired at a LTC. We have a pt. S/p sugery who came in with an indwelling catheter and a Supra pubic. When measuring output do we measure from each bag separately, even though they are both going into the bladder or do we measure output from each bag and add them up separately? Also...what's the logic behind two different caths being used at the same time?

[bugya90, ASN, BSN, LVN, RN]

Partly depends on how your charting system is set up. I had a patient with a chronic Supra pubic and an acute foley a few weeks ago. Both caths were documented on separately in the charting system so we could document site care/assessment on both. Since they were each listed separately in the system the output was recorded separately under the respective cath. The computer tallies all documented I&Os for us so it of course added it all together for the total output.