Bad Day!

[Krisna]

Okay, so I didn't go to dialysis yesterday because I was sick.  I have an infection in a couple teeth and I had a fever and was shaking and couldn't drive.  So, I rescheduled and called my doctor who called in an antibiotic for me.  (I get these infections often because my teeth are in dire shape.  In a battle with the insurance company.)  So, anyway I went in today instead.  Abt an hour into my run the nurse came by to give me my EPO.  She put it in the port of the arterial tubing and as soon as she pulled the needle out the machine alarmed and the blood pump stopped.  Then I looked up and saw a message I'd never seen before and both red lights on!  Look down and the drip bulbs are full of air and there is blood leaking from the port.  The seal around it was faulty or something.  Because it was the arterial side they couldn't give me my blood back!  So, the unhook me and flush my needles then they put new tubing up and start running saline through it.  I lost abt 30 minutes and tubing full of blood.  I got all the fluid off I needed too and my blood count was okay so I probably won't miss it much.  I will be going back tomorrow to resume my regular schedule but lost time is lost time!  Fortunately, I try not to miss treatment time or change days around very often so once in a while is okay!

I believe that the problem was the tubing and not anything the nurse did.  This is because the blood leak was around the port and not from the center where she inserted the needle.  Just wanted to make that clear.  This has happened to me once before with it leaking from the same exact place!

[lola]

Sorry you had such a crappy day, hope your feeling better soon.

[karen547]

That sounds like it was pretty scary! I hope you feel better soon

[boxman55]

Good lord, we on dialysis go through enough crap, these kinds of episodes are unnecessary. Sorry this happened...Boxman

[Joe Paul]

Hoping you feel better soon!

[CW]

That sux bigtime Krisna !! I am sorry you had to suffer through a bizarre situation like that. I  hope you have a dynamic, resourceful and knowledgeable medical team so that they can investigate this issue further. It seems to me that if it has happened more than once it should be looked into.

Does anyone know how much blood do you lose when they cannot return your blood? (in center hemo - common machine) 

CW

[Krisna]

That sux bigtime Krisna !! I am sorry you had to suffer through a bizarre situation like that. I  hope you have a dynamic, resourceful and knowledgeable medical team so that they can investigate this issue further. It seems to me that if it has happened more than once it should be looked into.

Does anyone know how much blood do you lose when they cannot return your blood? (in center hemo - common machine) 

CW

They pretty much know what happened.  The port or area where they inject meds into the tubing had a bad seal on the arterial tube.  They tried recirculating it at first to try and work the air out, which is protocol, but because the air was being sucked in through the arterial part recirculating didn't help!  It just got worse.  These things don't happen ofter but they do happen and it's nobody's fault really.  Well, except maybe the manufacturer who should have better inspection or quality control!  I'm just glad that the air sensor in the machine caught it right away.  When there's air in the lines the machine alarms, stops the blood pump and clamps the line to prevent any air from getting to the patient.  We have these new computerized machines so it stopped the pump right away! 

I'm sure they know how much blood the tubing holds but I don't know.  Whatever it holds at any one time.  It takes a lot to freak me out when it comes to my health.  Air in the lines used to happen a lot more when I was young. 

[CW]

I have never heard of anything like that happening and I treated for 6 years straight in 6 clinics. That is a bit scary but I am glad you are OK and you are right someone needs to let the manufacturer know about this defect . Maybe your social worker could assist you with making the complaint.

CW

[willieandwinnie]

Sorry you had a bad day Krisna. When we first started home hemo, we received a whole batch of bad tubing. I had those scissor clamps stuck everywhere. 2 times in a row I had to take Len off early and according to our center when that happens you lose about 250cc of blood. We ended up taking back the tubing and getting a different batch number.  Len was in-center for a year and I don't remember that every happening. I say a pray that you have smooth sailing from here on. 

[Cincygrandma]

My day yesterday wasn't as bad as yours, Krisna, but after a cannulation that went fairly easy and without the typical pain, I settled into my 4 hour treatment, thinking this was a good day!  About 20 minutes or so later the nurse came by with some meds and started looking at my machine in a funny way.  She said it wasn't running and had stopped after 3 minutes!  No alarms!!  I then recalled at one point looking over at the machine and thinking something didn't seem right with the tubing, but tubes were full of blood and didn't think anymore about it.  Our machines are kept back so you can't see the screens, only the side of the machine if you twist your head enough.  What I realized later was I didn't hear the noise or see the normal vibration of the tubing.  They returned my blood, and after 4 people couldn't figure out how to restart me, they had to set my machine up again.  I was nervous with all this going on, thinking I would have clotting at the least from it.  They assured me I'd be OK and of course I was.  I did hear one say this had happened a few days earlier and nobody knew why.  I just had to spend an extra couple hours in the chair and still have the aching back this morning from it.  I guess I don't understand why they don't seem to want to follow-up on machine problems to avoid them or understand how to deal with them.  I hope you get your dental issues worked out soon.  That must be hard to deal with, aside from problems with dialysis.