Transporting patients with Chest Tubes

[SJC1995]

Whenever a patient with a chest tube needs to go off the unit for a test, a RN must accompany the patient. This leave the unit covering that assignment until the patient and nurse return. Are any other hospitals doing this? Thank you

[RN403, BSN, RN]

Yes. Many facilities do this. RNs must also accompany patients that are on monitors, heparin drips, and etc.

[sallyrnrrt, ADN, RN]

yes common practice

[gassy2be]

Any ICU or CCU patient must be accompanied by an RN with a monitor.

[SubSippi]

This isn't the policy at my facility. We had a patient leave for tests once on portable suction. When he came back, the tube was disconnected and suction machine turned off.

Now it's a self imposed policy in my unit to accompany at patient with a chest tube.

[applewhitern, BSN, RN]

At every hospital I worked, the ICU and step-down units required to nurse to "go with" the patient, wherever that may be. It was a great PIA to disconnect tons of equipment, load up, go with, then "put them back together again." Took a great deal of time out of your shift, too. I would rather be with my patient, though; better safe than sorry. What would irk me, though, was to get back to the unit and the covering nurse would have done absolutely nothing for your other patient(s) while you were gone.

[firstinfamily, RN]

This is also the practice where I work. Any Heparin drip, telemetry pt, had to be accompanied by a nurse. This does leave the floor short and as a previous poster stated, most of the time the relieving nurse does not do anything for the patients left on the floor during the nurses absence. There was a time when nurses were expected to leave their assigned pts and transport pts to testing procedures, this is a huge waste of nursing time.

[MunoRN, RN]

I've never been somewhere that required a nurse go with the patient everywhere just because they have a chest tube, to be honest that doesn't really make a lot of sense.

[Here.I.Stand, BSN, RN]

We routinely do this, and we have a lot of stat and routine head CTs, MRIs, 2-view x-rays, etc. (We do have a portable CT scanner that we use if the pt can't travel--e.g. on hypothermia protocol--but the preference is a scan in the radiology dept b/c the pictures are better.) The RN has to go with for anyone on a cardiac monitor and "up"...which of course includes any ICU or stepdown pt. The other RNs on the unit cover for our other pt, same as they would if we left the unit for lunch. If things in the unit are really crazy, we can have the resource or rapid response RN come and help cover.

For a chest tube? Not necessarily, if they're a floor pt and not on the monitor.