Our Hospital is exploring the option of training ICU Nurses to perform Hemodialysis on their patients. Is anyone else doing this?

Check your state regulations regarding Technicians and LPNs. Virginia.Georgia, and Alabama ara states that allow Technicians to Dialyze the Chronic Hemodialysis patient who is in the hospital for an acute problem..

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Originally posted by Phyllis RN:
Our Hospital is exploring the option of training ICU Nurses to perform Hemodialysis on their patients. Is anyone else doing this?

Well Phyllis, we originally wanted to have our dialysis staff initiate dialysis and then have the ICU nurses monitor the tx. That went over like a lead balloon! They were VERY resistant to having to learn the the dialysis machine. So those inservices were a waste of time. We do have them monitor CVCCH after we've initiated treatment and then call the person on call if they have a problem i.e. the dialyzer clots. And we do have a tech run tx in ICU on occasion because the rationale is there is an R.N. assigned to that pt. should a problem arise-we're just there for the dialysis. Anything else, the assigned nurse takes care of it-we step aside.

This raises a good question. From a medical perspective, who is best suited to treat the patient - the intensivist or the nephrologist? The same question could be asked from a nursing perspective.

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Originally posted by Colin:
This raises a good question. From a medical perspective, who is best suited to treat the patient - the intensivist or the nephrologist? The same question could be asked from a nursing perspective.

Very Good point, our Nephrologists have an excellent working relationship with the intensivists, the intensivists take care of the ICU issues and the Nephrologist still takes care of the Nephrology/Dialysis issues.

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Originally posted by Phyllis RN:
Our Hospital is exploring the option of training ICU Nurses to perform Hemodialysis on their patients. Is anyone else doing this?

Phyllis,
I would be very concerned about this practice. I firmly believe that one should have a minimum of one year's diaysis experince before even doing Acute Dialysis as a Hemodialysis Nurse. A nurse just cannot learn all of the instant problem solving or decisons facing an Acute hemodialysis rx if she /he does not have the nephrology backgrouond. This would be similar to a dialysis nurse walking into ICU and being expected to do intra-aortic ballon monitoring or other comparable procedures.
Janice Knouff RN, BS, Certified Hemodialysis Nurse, Renal Clinical Resource
jknouff@healthdialog.com

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Originally posted by Phyllis RN:
Our Hospital is exploring the option of training ICU Nurses to perform Hemodialysis on their patients. Is anyone else doing this?

Phyllis,

I am a certified heomdialysis technician who currently works in a major hospital that uses techs in the chronic and acute settings. What is the need for training an ICU nurse who is already complaining about being over worked,when you can use qualified technicians??

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Originally posted by done that:

quote:

Originally posted by Phyllis RN:
[b]Our Hospital is exploring the option of training ICU Nurses to perform Hemodialysis on their patients. Is anyone else doing this?

Phyllis,

I am a certified heomdialysis technician who currently works in a major hospital that uses techs in the chronic and acute settings. What is the need for training an ICU nurse who is already complaining about being over worked,when you can use qualified technicians??[/B]

Most of my experience has been in an outpatient setting and I am very familiar with working with technicians. Our hospital supports approx. 650 dialysis patients in 7 different counties and we are the only hospital providing hemodialysis to these patients. We have seen a significant increase in the acuity of these patients and have decided to go to an all RN staff. Needless to say we do not utilize technicians or LPN's in our hospital and finding trained RN's to support these patient can be overwhelming.