TRAGEDY at Clinical!

Updated:   Published

student-needle-stick-vaccine-shot-patient.jpg.c68ed101c4c1bf4f328752a0a982197b.jpg

A friend was giving a vaccine to a patient at clinical and she" may or may not" have stuck her self with the needle and than immediately stuck the patient, when the gloves came off she realized she was bleeding!! And that she did actually stick her self! ( by this time the patient left), and the instructor was contacted and she escalated it to the head of the department. The student was allowed to stay for the rest of the day. What are your thoughts? Do you think she has a chance to stay in the program? 

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Med/Surg, LTACH, LTC, Home Health.

Let the process take its course. I will say that an incident like this will prompt a review of overall individual performance in the program thus far when deciding on a course of action. A review of the number of incidents in the program itself will take place as well (I’m guessing).

I will also say that if one “may or may not” have stuck oneself, it is better to err on the side of caution, treat it as a needle stick, and discard the needle and/or entire syringe. This is part of the critical thinking that’s expected of nurses in protecting the patients. 

In the interest of transparency, the school will have to notify the patient. There may be unimaginable fallout behind that. The general public often looks for any opportunity for healthcare criticism and lawsuits even if no actual physical harm came to the persons of interest. But the incident and/or institutional embarrassment itself may dictate undesirable action to the student and possibly her instructor. Personally, I believe the instructor may get by because the student said nothing until after the fact.
 

So just wait and see, but don’t be surprised if you hear nothing regarding the outcome of this situation unless you and the student in question are close friends. Often times, the transparency is limited to a need-to-know basis only. 

3
Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in retired LTC.

I am assuming that the student did check in with the Employee Heath office to initiate appropriate protocol.

fa - welcome to AN. To all newbies, I suggest that you consider an anonymous screen name here. Lots of folk read posts here (school, employers, etc), so it is recommended that you fly below the radar and stay safe.

 

2
Up Vote Up Vote ×

Not sure I would consider this a tragedy. I suppose it could be considered so for the pt if the student has any bloodborne diseases. My understanding is that the student stuck themselves THEN the pt, therefore the risk is to the pt, not the student. I agree that the student should have discarded the needle/syringe and started over when they suspected they may have stuck themselves. 

This is not your problem as a classmate, other than being concerned or wondering what will happen to them. I would imagine the pt will be contacted and the student may be asked to be screened for bloodborne diseases. Unless your classmate shares this with you, you may never know. 

I think the concern of the instructor/school would be not so much the fact that the student had an accidental needle stick, but that they proceeded to use the possibly contaminated needle on the pt. That's a way bigger issue than a slip of the hand that could happen to anyone. 

Hope it all works out for everyone. 

5
Up Vote Up Vote ×

"I think the concern of the instructor/school would be not so much the fact that the student had an accidental needle stick, but that they proceeded to use the possibly contaminated needle on the pt."

You are assuming the student didn't scrape herself as she was darting the needle into the patient. If this case, it wasn't done intentionally.

As far as her staying in her clinical, it really depends on your program. In my program, they would have kicked her out. In other programs, mistakes were considered learning experiences for the entire clinical group.

1
Up Vote Up Vote ×

update. she stays in the program! Basically she lied about what happened and got away with it.

1
Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in retired LTC.

Karma can be a real b*tch. Everything that goes around comes around. (And prob some other clichés.)

It'll catch up to her eventually. (Except nobody wants to wait for it to do so.)

3
Up Vote Up Vote ×
On 10/31/2021 at 12:55 AM, fatima abdulla said:

So a friend was giving a vaccine to a patient at clinical and she" may or may not" have stuck her self with the needle and than immediately stuck the patient, when the gloves came off she realized she was bleeding!! And that she did actually stick her self! ...

Did she stick herself?  Or not?  And how do you know?

On 10/31/2021 at 12:55 AM, fatima abdulla said:

... ( by this time the patient left), and the instructor was contacted and she escalated it to the head of the department. The student was allowed to stay for the rest of the day. What are your thoughts? do you think she has a chance to stay in the program? 

Assuming that this happened as described.  The student reported it to the instructor, who the escalated it to the "head of the department."  What else, in your opinion should be done?

16 hours ago, fatima abdulla said:

update. she stays in the program! Basically she lied about what happened and got away with it [emphasis added].

As personnel matters are typically confidential, you know this how?

40 minutes ago, amoLucia said:

Karma can be a real b*tch. Everything that goes around comes around. (And prob some other clichés.)

[...]

How so?  If the event occurred as described, how do you see this as anything other than an error in practice? 

44 minutes ago, amoLucia said:

[...]

It'll catch up to her eventually. (Except nobody wants to wait for it to do so.)

As for the student,, what exactly do you think should "catch up to her eventually?"  Considering, again if the event occurred as described, that the student reported the event to the clinical advisor, what else should the student have done?  

3
Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Community health.
1 hour ago, chare said:

As for the student,, what exactly do you think should "catch up to her eventually?"  Considering, again if the event occurred as described, that the student reported the event to the clinical advisor, what else should the student have done?  

I think that what the poster meant was: The student lied about it to avoid getting in trouble. It worked, apparently. I think the allnurses poster above was saying that the lie will come back to haunt her eventually OR being a dishonest person will eventually catch up with her some other way.

4
Up Vote Up Vote ×
18 minutes ago, CommunityRNBSN said:

I think that what the poster meant was: The student lied about it to avoid getting in trouble. It worked, apparently. I think the allnurses poster above was saying that the lie will come back to haunt her eventually OR being a dishonest person will eventually catch up with her some other way.

Perhaps, however that is not the way that I read it.  Perhaps @amoLucia will come back and clarify her/his post.

Thanks for your response.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

...she probably told the program director she didn't know anything had gone wrong until she saw blood after all was said and done, when in reality she suspected in real time that she might have accidentally poked herself but went through with the injection anyway.

(I too read the karma posts as being about that ^ possibility/the lying).

Forgive my speculation!

1
Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in CNA.
1 hour ago, JKL33 said:

...she probably told the program director she didn't know anything had gone wrong until she saw blood after all was said and done, when in reality she suspected in real time that she might have accidentally poked herself but went through with the injection anyway.

(I too read the karma posts as being about that ^ possibility/the lying).

Forgive my speculation!

What does that last part mean ?

Up Vote Up Vote ×
+ Join the Discussion