IV Infusion – A nurse’s responsibility

Recently I had a patient who had a PICC line and another IV line on the other arm. There were 3 different IV fluids hooked on the patient plus the additional blood transfusion the Physician ordered.

Administering medication between I&O’s and vital signs is not a problem. A midst the standards in doing these procedures a thought came in my mind. How are we left behind when it comes to technology and healthcare fusion in Government hospitals?

IV Infusion at SLMC QC

When one of my friends recently had an appendectomy done in one of the premiered hospitals in the country, I noticed that they use IV infusion pumps. Yep! Embarrassing as it may sound, I took a picture of it and showed to other nurses in the ward where I work. This machine attached on the IV stand would have saved not just time and effort but would also have provided accurate infusion of TPN, IV fluids and BTs we needed to transfuse.

TPN: Kabiven 1920 ml

Aside from doing manual regulation of the TPN and the main IV fluid (which was done hourly as ordered), everything was computed manually. And that’s how Pinoy nurses are best at! Making all things as accurate as possible and giving the best nursing care with or without the technology the world offers now.

Speaking of technology and healthcare, I have seen this video from Baxter website : The Sigma Spectrum Infusion System. Oh yeah. It doesn’t sound like we can afford that but the video simply shows that this IV infusion pump transmits directly to the hospitals’s information data base and reflects directly to the patient’s chart electronically. Not only that it records the time and regulation of the IV fluids, it is also being used to receive the actual Doctor’s order for the time of infusion and kind of IV fluid and also to verify corrects patient’s name. It also mentioned that this infusion system provides 5 Rights in giving medication (Right Patient, Right Drug, Right Dose, Right Route and Right Time).

Nevertheless, this is not to put to ridicule how we really are left behind when it comes technology and healthcare but to also aim high, that someday we will not just be skilled nurses but also competitive in using world-class technology.