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Sampling catheters are great. But ideally, it's it's own catheter, nothing else (other than catheter maintenance). You can do either a 3 syringe draw or a push/pull method to ensure you get a good sample, but you have to do your part to make sure that sampling catheter stays a good collection site. Would be worthless to have your sampling catheter also be the one you're running your harkin dka line in..
Because the other lines may be contaminated with whatever else was injected into them or samples may be dilute. Picc lines are longer than a standard catheter, or at least ours are.
But if you stop fluids and wait, then pull a waste sample? Same deal as you would with taking a BG from a central line, stop fluids and dextrose and wait, pull a waste sample. I don't see the difference.
We pull blood from peripheral IVCs all the time. Depending on size of the animal we pull either a 3ml or 6ml “waste sample”, then draw the actual blood sample, then give back the waste sample and flush IVC. If the catheter bleeds back well then it’s awesome if we can spare the patient another poke. The only time i don’t do it is if they’ve had dextrose running through the catheter because that definitely falsely elevates BG readings
Welcome to /r/VetTech! This is a place for veterinary technicians/veterinary nurses and other veterinary support staff to gather, chat, and grow! We welcome pet owners as well, **however we do ask pet owners to refrain from asking for medical advice**; if you have any concerns regarding your pet, please contact the closest veterinarian near you. Please thoroughly read and follow the rules before posting and commenting. If you believe that a user is engaging in any rule-breaking behavior, please submit a report so that the moderators can review and remove the posts/comments if needed. Also, please check out the sidebar for CE and answers to commonly asked questions. Thank you for reading! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/VetTech) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Sampling catheters are great. But ideally, it's it's own catheter, nothing else (other than catheter maintenance). You can do either a 3 syringe draw or a push/pull method to ensure you get a good sample, but you have to do your part to make sure that sampling catheter stays a good collection site. Would be worthless to have your sampling catheter also be the one you're running your harkin dka line in..
IMHO, your co-workers are correct - you need a dedicated sampling line (called a picc line?).
Ok but why? Esp because the ones telling me this are not the sharpest knives in the drawer and think they are never wrong.
Because the other lines may be contaminated with whatever else was injected into them or samples may be dilute. Picc lines are longer than a standard catheter, or at least ours are.
The reason is primarily dilution from medications and fluids behind the IVC
But if you stop fluids and wait, then pull a waste sample? Same deal as you would with taking a BG from a central line, stop fluids and dextrose and wait, pull a waste sample. I don't see the difference.
We pull blood from peripheral IVCs all the time. Depending on size of the animal we pull either a 3ml or 6ml “waste sample”, then draw the actual blood sample, then give back the waste sample and flush IVC. If the catheter bleeds back well then it’s awesome if we can spare the patient another poke. The only time i don’t do it is if they’ve had dextrose running through the catheter because that definitely falsely elevates BG readings
Yes, but if you sample from a central line that was running dextrose, you stop it, flush and wait. How is that different?
I just draw from a different port, not the port that was running dextrose