Yesterday, we learned to do venous blood draws and place an IV catheter. As I mentioned before we practiced on each other. We first watched a video and then went into a room to practice the placing the IV catheters. There's a needle that has a catheter (which is just a little tube over the top) on it. You stick the person's vein with the needle and the catheter over the top and then while the needle is in you slide the catheter farther into the vessel and pull the needle out.
Our first station was to practice the IV's on a fake hand, then we did the venous blood draw, which wasn't too bad. Lucky me - I have big veins that are hard to miss. Poor Carrie (my partner) - whose veins like to hide out. I got blood on the first try though! Then next was IV's. This scared me the most because we do it in the back of the hands and you know it's painful. Success, once again! This is why if being a doc doesn't work out then I could always go into phlebotomy.
Let's see what else have I learned? We learned to place Foley catheter's yesterday. That's a tube up the urethra. It was rather painful to watch on the video. Wouldn't be the most fun thing to have done. We didn't practice these on each other. We have mannequins for that with a fake bladder and pee - the whole works.
Lumbar punctures were today. Again practiced on a mannequin with fake spinal fluid. Note to self: definitely do not want to have one of those done. That is one BIG needle that is going very very far into one's back and they take more fluid than you would think.
ABGs (arterial blood gases) - this is where take blood from an artery and send it off to get the concentration of oxygen, carbon dioxide, pH, etc from the arterial blood. Here you feel for the radial pulse and then keep one hand on the pulse and with the other - aim the needle and hope you hit it! Again with a mannequin.
Tomorrow morning is practice pelvic exams. I've done a pelvic before, but these are standardized patients who will be able to tell you if you are feeling certain things or not. I've never felt an ovary - so hopefully by tomorrow.
The motto for our learning is: See one, do one, teach one.
As a patient would that scare you?
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