The facility that I work at is considering having a "access sticking room". The patient will arrive for treatment, come into the sticking room, the charge nurse will assess the patient, the patients access will be washed with antibacterial soap, prep applied, needles placed, heparin given, then sent into the unit for their treatment. Possible advantages of this are 1) charge nurse immediately will assess all patients 2) more control on preps and doing them correctly therefore less access infections 3) consistent "expert" stickers. Is there anyone who has ever worked in a unit that has done something like this? If so, how did it work and did you like it? What do other people think about this idea? Please let me know, we are in the process or remodeling and would like to have this room built in asap if we decide to. Thanks!

Merritt

Would patients be walking into the unit with the needles in their arm, or would they be pushed in a wheelchair?

This does not seem to be a very good idea to me. Will you be separating patients that are HIV+, HepB, HepC....etc.....What if there are cannulation problems....bleeding, infiltrations etc.

What about catheter patients....I think they should be cannulated in their chair. I have NEVER heard of anyone even considering this..

Infection Control will be an issue.

Also, then you have someone sticking the patient, and another initiating the treatment. If a needle concern comes up..who will be responsible for attempting to correct the problem. How long of a lag will there be between cannulation and initiation....would clotting be a concern?

If you have "expert stickers" doing this...other will NEVER become proficient due to lack of experience...people are off sick, call in, leave facility etc....sorry but sounds like a bad idea to me.

T

One advantage may be if the patient is heparinized at the cannulation stage the patient will have been heparinized for the minimum five minutes. This could be a major advantage. Patients that are not adequately heparinized will clott the dialyzer. When you cannulate the patient at the hemodialysis machine the five minutes usually does not take place.

This is not a new or novel idea. I tried this out about 8 years ago.It works if everyone is cooperative. In reality it is only done to expedite the dialysis procedure.Slow down YOUR PATIENTS will appreciate the one on one care that they currently recieve.