Patty--Diluted meds and fatigue

March 2, 2005

I amso sorry that you has such a horrible time with those nurses. I

really hate when that happens because it gives good nurses a bad

name. It is common practice to dilute meds. Actually I get ticked

off when it is NOT diluted as most meds are extrememely toxic to

veins and can blow an IV site in a heart beat. Anyway, I always

dilute the med in saline in a 5cc or 10cc syringe and give the

entire dose.

However, there are times when the doc lets say order Demerol 50mg

and all you have are 100mg doses. You dilute it in a 100cc syrine

and then administer 5cc. BUT, the part that is wasted or thrown

aways cant just be tossed in the sharp box. You have to have a

witness see you drain the remaining amount from the syringe and that

is documented, usually in the computer the meds come out of. Since

that nurse tossed the remaining dose in the sharps container she

made a HUGE mistake or it was part of her plan. To fish it out

later for her own use. There was a person at MUSC that would go to

the trash and take all the sharp boxes to get the little bits left,

disgusting huh, but dopers do that kind of stuff.

I agree that you should write a letter complaining about this nurse

there is a very strong likelyhood that she was stashing your

remaining dose for her own personal use. At least that was my first

thought when I read your post.

When I was at my worse I stayed extremely exhausted, falling asleep

at the wheel, nodding off in the parking lot, would get home and

just crash, in full uniform without even showering (which I never do

because I dealt with so many nasty people). It was very scarey and

there was nothing I could do about it, coffee, sodas, nothing, I

would sleep endlessly then wake up tired. I dont know why that

happened, but I suspect it was a nutritional deficit of some kind,

maybe protien.

Hope you are feeling better and I do feel that you should let the

hospital heads know of your experiences with those nurses. You may,

in the long run, be doing them a favor.

Warmly,

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