chrishansenhome (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
chrishansenhome) wrote2011-12-10 05:16 pm
chrishansenhome) wrote2011-12-10 05:16 pm
Crappy Saturday
The District Nurse came today and we decided to change the dressing on my PICC line. First mistake: never do anything unsupervised when you've not done it before. Second mistake: don't do anything out of the ordinary on a weekend, medical-wise.
She is a good nurse but she was relying on me to tell her what to do (since I've seen it done often). I did my best, but she wasn't following my directions—specifically, she wasn't removing the dressing correctly and didn't listen when I told her how to remove it from around the port area.
The result was that about 1 cm of the tube came out of my arm due to her tugging.
She said that she would call the hospital and ask what to do, and I told her that she would be very lucky to get hold of someone who could tell her what to do. This was around 1 pm. At around 5 pm she called me back and said that indeed she hadn't been able to get to the person who could tell her what to do. The microbiology department suggested that I go to A&E (=US "the emergency room") and have an X-ray to ensure that the tube was still in a relatively good position. I can imagine that showing at up A&E at 6 pm with an emergency that was non-bleeding and non-painful will involve being seen at around 10 pm, if then. I told her that instead I would like to skip tomorrow's antibiotic and go into the Foot Clinic Monday morning to have it sorted out. She wasn't too happy with that and is calling other doctors for their opinions.
I am very annoyed about this. Worst case scenario is that I have to have this line removed and another one installed. The tube can't be re-inserted due to the fact that now that it's been out of my body it's gotten germs of one sort or another on it and if it were put back in it would insert the germs directly into my bloodstream, which is not a good move.
It is so important that nurses who work in the community be trained to work with PICC lines in their entirety, especially when it comes to dressing changes and unforeseen circumstances such as blockages in the lines. And it's important that when things go wrong during the weekend someone is available and on call to deal with it.
Crumbs.
Edit: The nurse came back, with reinforcements. A doctor on the ward told them that as long as they could withdraw blood from the line it would be fine. So they withdrew some blood and it looks OK for now. They will put some antibiotic in tomorrow, slowly, and Monday I will go to the Foot Clinic and probably spend all day getting this sorted.
She is a good nurse but she was relying on me to tell her what to do (since I've seen it done often). I did my best, but she wasn't following my directions—specifically, she wasn't removing the dressing correctly and didn't listen when I told her how to remove it from around the port area.
The result was that about 1 cm of the tube came out of my arm due to her tugging.
She said that she would call the hospital and ask what to do, and I told her that she would be very lucky to get hold of someone who could tell her what to do. This was around 1 pm. At around 5 pm she called me back and said that indeed she hadn't been able to get to the person who could tell her what to do. The microbiology department suggested that I go to A&E (=US "the emergency room") and have an X-ray to ensure that the tube was still in a relatively good position. I can imagine that showing at up A&E at 6 pm with an emergency that was non-bleeding and non-painful will involve being seen at around 10 pm, if then. I told her that instead I would like to skip tomorrow's antibiotic and go into the Foot Clinic Monday morning to have it sorted out. She wasn't too happy with that and is calling other doctors for their opinions.
I am very annoyed about this. Worst case scenario is that I have to have this line removed and another one installed. The tube can't be re-inserted due to the fact that now that it's been out of my body it's gotten germs of one sort or another on it and if it were put back in it would insert the germs directly into my bloodstream, which is not a good move.
It is so important that nurses who work in the community be trained to work with PICC lines in their entirety, especially when it comes to dressing changes and unforeseen circumstances such as blockages in the lines. And it's important that when things go wrong during the weekend someone is available and on call to deal with it.
Crumbs.
Edit: The nurse came back, with reinforcements. A doctor on the ward told them that as long as they could withdraw blood from the line it would be fine. So they withdrew some blood and it looks OK for now. They will put some antibiotic in tomorrow, slowly, and Monday I will go to the Foot Clinic and probably spend all day getting this sorted.