When is a gurney unacceptable?

[linda2097]

I work in the O.R. and was wondering when to bring the patient to PACU on a gurney and when to bring the patient on to PACU on a bed.

[ineedcoffee]

Not sure what your guidelines are. If they are bariatric patients (big people) or ortho patients (more eqipment), they usually need the extra room, so they are on beds.

[Southern Fried RN]

ICU patients

Craniotomies (falls under ICU anyways)

Total knee and total hip replacements

Major spinal cases

That's the protocol @ my facility.

[shellabelle]

any joint replacement, spinal surgery, open belly surgery(minus open appy), crani, or large patients should come out on a bed. any kind of hip surgery(even closed reductions) should come out on a bed. any patient that will be discharged or patients with more "minor" procedures can come out on a stretcher. It is always nice to bring a patient that has had a spinal block on a bed...we don't like hurting our backs to pull dead weight over to a bed :)

[sm9796]

For our PACU:

joint patients

ICU patients

bariatric, etc

The problem is that there aren't always beds available on the wards, so even if a pt is meant to be on a bed they may be left on a gurney in PACU for several hours until a bed becomes available.

If it's a more minor procedure and they pt can easily transfer to the ward bed once they get there (eg wrist ORIF) then we don't worry too much about getting their bed up from the ward

[Rose_Queen, BSN, MSN, RN]

Unfortunately, our hospital is not uniform for beds. This unit won't accept that unit's bed or that unit's bed won't fit in this unit's rooms. When we call for a bed, we usually end up getting the old beds that NO unit will accept. So basically unless a patient has already been assigned a clean, unoccupied bed or is an ICU or step-down unit patient (for some reason, the beds used in critical care are the only ones there are extras of), the chance of a patient coming out on a bed and staying on that bed is minimal. Unfortunately for the patient, that means we in the OR don't really bother trying anymore.