Reply to IV during labor?

Forum Index » Expectant and Postpartum Moms

Reply to "IV during labor?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Former RN here. I've seen cases where it took incredibly experienced nurses more than 20 tries to place an IV in a dehydrated patient. In one case I recall, our resident IV expert (former prison nurse who excelled at finding veins even in junkies) could NOT find a vein on a 20 something young woman. Next step was to call in the flight nurses (trauma team) to try. Oops, flight nurses were on a flight. Next up: anesthesiologist. Oops, all were otherwise engaged with patients. The poor girl was about two minutes from having a central line placed (MUCH more invasive than IV and placed in the patient's neck or chest) when FINALLY, after dozens of tries, we finally found a vein in her lower leg. This all took probably around two hours and by then she was in far more serious condition.

Now clearly that's not typical - but I share it as an example of an otherwise healthy young woman who happened to be fairly dehydrated and was suddenly a terrible candidate for a "quick and easy" IV.  There is no good reason to refuse having a saline lock placed. It could make a HUGE difference in case you eventually do need fluids or IV medication.

Keep in mind that agreeing to a saline lock doesn't mean you agree to anything else. It's just a good safety measure to have one in place. [/quote]

Just out of curiosity, for any L and D nurses out there: provided a normal, laboring woman has been able to drink fluids as desired, how often does this happen? My OB said she required at least the heplock because she'd seen too many ugly cases like this, but I know that midwives "allow" food and drink as desired. Answers, people with more education than I?[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics