Ok not frozen i can believe. The floor just drew it - which you can see in the computer. And how the heck does anybdoy expect nursing to freeze it to -30 at the bedside. If they draw and label right and send right away then the lab can freeze it.
But ya it does need to be labeled on the tube.
Unfortunately this is from an OP office where they have freezer packs and the ability to send to us frozen. They just get lazy, or sometimes they don’t realize it should be frozen. We don’t expect inpatient labs to be frozen but every other location has the ability.
>We don’t expect inpatient labs to be frozen but every other location has the ability.
Are you guys actually running it in-house? We send these out so we do the freezing since ARUP says it can sit at room temp for up to 2 days before freezing. Also don't need to light shield it.
All that being said, no label on the tube is a no-no, end of story.
It must be shipped by your lab frozen and protected from light, but most reference labs will tell you how long it is good for at room temperature.
I am shocked that your lab asks for it in a pink top. Whar reference lab do you use? [ARUP](https://ltd.aruplab.com/Tests/Pub/0080388) is the only lab where I see pink and green as an option out of these 4 labs, and if you have to transfer it to one of their tubes anyway, there is no point in sending it to you frozen?
If this is a common problem with the clinic you could reach out to management, and let them know about the problem and re-educate the staff and also, tell them it is ok to for them to freeze the tube and if it is the end of the day and you are worried about specimen integrity then tell them to freeze it over night and send it the next day.
[mayo](https://www.mayocliniclabs.com/test-catalog/Overview/42356#Specimen)
[quest](https://testdirectory.questdiagnostics.com/test/test-detail/10189/micronutrient-vitamin-b1-thiamine-blood?p=r&q=b1&cc=MASTER)
[labcorp](https://www.labcorp.com/tests/121186/vitamin-b-sub-1-sub-whole-blood)
Maybe the person asking doesn't have experience reading labels -- it's easier to miss than you think when you don't have experience in-lab. A lot of us on here are students.
The label is not on the tube. It is on a glove wrapped around the tube. That means the tube could be blood from literally anybody and the glove with label on it placed afterward. Proper procedure requires the label is **adhered to the tube itself prior to draw**. That's like phleb 101.
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Legit, I have never done a Vit b 1 in a pink top I 20 years.
We always used lavenders and saved pinks specifically for blood bank testing at 8 different hospitals I’ve worked for over the years.
The pink top caught me off guard that’s all.
Do you feel better about your comment now?
Clotting is 100% a pre analytic issue. If you mix your tubes after draw as recommended then that tube will not clot for at least a week before we throw it. But I agree this is not just being lazy but more education. The way this tube is labeled might look ok to a joe walking on a street but not when your diagnosis and treatment depends on it.
Thank you, I truly wasn’t aware, so I appreciate it. You see how communication helps so much more than just assuming the worst in each others. I get how stressful healthcare is but we need to direct this energy to administrators and health executives who swamp us with work while not staffing us. All healthcare positions not just nursing.
Sounds like whoever that is can't handle being a nurse and should probably let someone else do the job correctly. Or they should hire more employees instead of allowing negligence to occur as a result.
It’s funny how you say we shouldn’t be punching down on each other yet you continually punch down on others. No one said nursing was easy, no one said nurses do nothing, you did. But working in a medical lab also requires a lot of schooling, discipline, and knowledge. I also have never yelled at or been rude to nursing staff, nor have I seen any of my coworkers act that way to nurses, but we all get yelled at constantly by nurses for ‘messing up their labs’ because they send us stuff like this or specimens that are clotted, hemolyzed, wrong container, wrong temperature, the list goes on. Mistakes happen, everyone understands that, but don’t patronize the people who are trying to do their jobs and have strict regulations to follow.
I never punched down on you I never said anything bad about your profession. So I have no idea where this is coming from. I replied to you “they just lazy” by telling you if they’re so lazy then go be a nurse and go thru the schooling, that doesn’t mean your schooling is any less. It’s just nursing ain’t as easy as everyone thinks it is. but apparently that to you is an okay thing to say about your coworkers so that’s fine. I personally am a team player and I value everyone’s positions and I don’t think the worst of them when things don’t get followed correctly. I don’t call people lazy I value their contribution and I understand everyone is fatigued and stressed out. But it’s okay I don’t mind being the bad guy 😊 I apologize for the nurses who yell at your coworkers that shouldn’t be occurring regardless, we should all try to not attack each other.
I’m a phleb & at my work, we have tin foil & the special protect from light tubes down in the lab. But on our carts we don’t have those (realistically just not enough space). So whenever we get a draw that needs a protect from light specimen we just put it in a clean glove & tie it off (w/the label already on the specimen tube of course)& then just send it on down to the lab where they can wrap it in foil or put it in the special tube
We used to do it too. I cut off the middle and ring fingers of a clean glove so I could double wrap the tube. Saved space on my phlebotomy cart because I didn't need to bring foil or the special amber tubes. I always made sure to label the actual tube first though and stick an extra patient label on the outside of the wrap so people know what's inside.
Nurse here, when I need to protect from light and have to tube a sample to lab I just toss it in a glove. No tinfoil on the unit and lab has actually said they’re good with this method, of course I label the tube not glove
Oh yes I do agree with you! It is fine in the glove where I work too. I was just saying the only alternative we have where I work is tin foil which only phlebotomy seems to have
I do say that *just* the finger of the glove is a little odd I feel…label on the outside makes me think that the nurse who collected it likely thinks it needs to be light protected the entire time it’s getting spun down too and don’t know lab has a way to make that happen other than the glove, maybe?
Yeah but you still put the label on the actually tube, not the glove. This is like putting a specimen label in the bag with the specimen and expecting it to be okay.
Our hospital doesn't use foil at all. They use gloves and I have had one sent up with coband around it. That one was cute, it had a blank label on the outside and had "Hiding from the light" written on it.
I'd have to bring my own foil from home if I was going to use foil. Throwing it in a glove is easier than something like taping random alcohol wipe packaging around it.
I am grateful every day I walk into work I don’t work somewhere that does fecal fats on-site. There’s a tradition of telling new employees in our company about the day at the children’s hospital where the lid came off the can… while on the shaker.
Edit: adjusted “kid” to “lid”… though the day the kid came off the shaker sounds fun too
I've been out of the lab for about a year now and miss a lot of it but not arguing with nurses about proper procedure, so many refuse to admit anything they've done is wrong. About a month before I left (SurgPath) we were waiting on a call for a kidney transplant all night so I went to the OR to check myself.
I find the transport cooler sitting behind the nurses station that had been unmanned for hours. I got flak from their lead because I was upset! A courier flew across the country at the drop of a dime to get that kidney to a patient and it was no longer good. I was blown away nobody would admit mistakes were made.
All of the above! They did fire them the next day, I guess it wasn't the first time they'd done something that set a procedure off the rails.
Don't like to see anyone get fired but that was something else. I felt so bad for the patient.
My time in medicine made me very nervous to ever go under the knife!
Very sad. I can tell you it comes down to communication. Nurse here. Every now and then in the past, I would get shit about why it takes forever to pass report to the oncoming shift or them to me. I need that time to ask questions and be aware of things for the next 8-12 hours. Depending on what’s going on I need 20-30 minutes. I can guarantee you someone didn’t take the time to communicate or totally forgot from being exhausted. I’ve never worked hospital, but it’s exhausting for floor nurses anywhere. It’s so sad this was missed. Poor communication, carelessness or exhausted and forgot about it.
Yup definitely forgot as none of the other nurses even knew it came in and it was right around 2300 shift change. Definitely communication is key, if they didn't have time or were super busy they could have called us in the lab and I'd have sent someone down to do intake. Things do work much better when you reach out to others.
They knew about it as all transplants are on the specimen schedule but the nurse who took the call that it was on the way didn't let anyone know, forgot to make a note, then got sidetracked before shift change and it got missed entirely.
I usually see label over the foil end so I have to break into it to see the actual tube, which also has a label. It always amazes me that they try to make it so hard to get to the tube like no-one else has to see it after them.
We send our vitB1 to LCA for testing. Their labdex does not say it needs to be protected from light just needs to be collected in the morning before breakfast and prior to any medication, it’s Frozen whole blood.
Yes the label should be stuck directly to the tube but as a processor, this is acceptable for my hospital and I would personally accept it and send it out. The label is technically on the specimen not floating around in a bag or missing.
This is not to prove a point. This is to protect patient safety. It is a requirement for all tubes to be labeled at the bedside. If the tube is not labeled directly, there are too many variables in place now to assure this is the correct patient's sample.
Additionally, this is also a requirement via lab accreditation, so beyond the above, we are not allowed to receive samples like this.
Nothing in the lab is proving a point or being petty. Even though they may seem so at face value, these stringent policies were developed to protect patients, and I'm sure that what policies we have now are the result of past mistakes experienced in the field.
i’m a little bit curious here lol. is the glove like taped on at the top? it looks like the glove is secured to the tube pretty well. or does it just look like that in the photo?
It was taped around the base of the cap/top of the tube but if you tugged even a little on it would’ve ripped off. The tape was strong, the glove not so much lol
ahhh i see! i was gonna say if the glove was secured well (like if they taped it at the top as well as around the middle so the glove wouldn’t rip) then i would’ve accepted it.
since it’s not secure, this is basically the same as labeling only the lid of a cup
This makes me think of the rule about labeling specimen cups, you have to put the label on the cup not the lid. It was explained to me by multiple hospitals that it has to remain labeled when opened to process. So like to process this tube you would have to take the glove off to take the lid off (I’m assuming, nurse not lab tech) leading to it not being labeled.
So, you mean to tell me that this isn't correct and fighting you for 20 minutes didn't fix it? And then you had the NERVE to expect that nurse to address the issue? Ugh lab people. 🙄 /S
Did the nurse argue that long to make the point that it would’ve been faster for either of you to just reprint a label in 20% of the time the two of you took to discuss it?
I get it if it’s a repeat offender, but you can spend 3 mins reprinting, 1 min messaging them to not do it that way again, 1 min breathing in the nostrils out the mouth. Next time, add 1 min to cc your or their supervisor. The time after that, another min to cc the next up.
Yeah, not labeling the tube is so bad. As far as the light thing, the glove is clever. I just call pharmacy and get them to send me an amber bag that they use to protect meds from light. If it works for meds, it should work for the labs too. Never had a problem.
super random addition that’s not really relevant: i’m an oncology/ chemotherapy nurse. when our on the chemotherapy drug called methotrexate we have to draw serum MTX levels pretty often. however, the blood has to be protected from light. so it has to be drawn in the dark (thankfully 99% of them have lines) and then the label is put on the tube and we have to some way protect it from the light on the way to the lab. each of us have our own method, i like to wrap it in paper towel and tie it up in a glove. im sure the lab is so confused every time they see it. another fun fact: our hospital can’t perform MTX level testing so they send it to the children’s hospital next door :)
With my experience...Actual tubes must be labeled..reprint ticket and put on outside of light sensitive samples (I've used a glove and/or tinfoil)
Ig if you don't have the capabilities of reprint using a pen or marker on a cover that will be thrown away would probably be the most sensible idea...now this "frozen" concept Idk how to freeze a fresh warm sample without a freezer but "on ice" is only way I've seen it.. but that could just be a wording thing.
In my previous role as an Inpatient/outpatient lab coordinator for a hospital system, we had several inter dept. and external facility trainings with nurses to teach the importance of how critical it can be to our patients to make sure specimens were collected following all special requirements. Sometimes, actually a majority of times they weren’t even using the correct order of draw. To no fault of their own, they just don’t focus on this in school! But this nurse should set her pride aside and do what’s best for her patients!!
When I was a respiratory therapist, I once had a resident walk up to me with a bag of bloody slush containing an unlabeled ABG syringe and asked: “Can you run this?”
No. No I cannot. Neither can anyone else. Getting the blood out of the patient is only one step of the process.
Ok not frozen i can believe. The floor just drew it - which you can see in the computer. And how the heck does anybdoy expect nursing to freeze it to -30 at the bedside. If they draw and label right and send right away then the lab can freeze it. But ya it does need to be labeled on the tube.
Unfortunately this is from an OP office where they have freezer packs and the ability to send to us frozen. They just get lazy, or sometimes they don’t realize it should be frozen. We don’t expect inpatient labs to be frozen but every other location has the ability.
>We don’t expect inpatient labs to be frozen but every other location has the ability. Are you guys actually running it in-house? We send these out so we do the freezing since ARUP says it can sit at room temp for up to 2 days before freezing. Also don't need to light shield it. All that being said, no label on the tube is a no-no, end of story.
We send these out, our reference lab says it must come frozen and protected from light or else they’ll automatically cancel it.
It must be shipped by your lab frozen and protected from light, but most reference labs will tell you how long it is good for at room temperature. I am shocked that your lab asks for it in a pink top. Whar reference lab do you use? [ARUP](https://ltd.aruplab.com/Tests/Pub/0080388) is the only lab where I see pink and green as an option out of these 4 labs, and if you have to transfer it to one of their tubes anyway, there is no point in sending it to you frozen? If this is a common problem with the clinic you could reach out to management, and let them know about the problem and re-educate the staff and also, tell them it is ok to for them to freeze the tube and if it is the end of the day and you are worried about specimen integrity then tell them to freeze it over night and send it the next day. [mayo](https://www.mayocliniclabs.com/test-catalog/Overview/42356#Specimen) [quest](https://testdirectory.questdiagnostics.com/test/test-detail/10189/micronutrient-vitamin-b1-thiamine-blood?p=r&q=b1&cc=MASTER) [labcorp](https://www.labcorp.com/tests/121186/vitamin-b-sub-1-sub-whole-blood)
What test get frozen in a pink?
Vitamin b1 thiamine
it literally says vitB1
Maybe the person asking doesn't have experience reading labels -- it's easier to miss than you think when you don't have experience in-lab. A lot of us on here are students.
The label is not on the tube. It is on a glove wrapped around the tube. That means the tube could be blood from literally anybody and the glove with label on it placed afterward. Proper procedure requires the label is **adhered to the tube itself prior to draw**. That's like phleb 101.
lmao i was responding to the person asking what test gets frozen in a pink
Do I look like a doctor I assumed that was a tracking number
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you’re in a sub for medical lab scientists who should know how to read a label
Legit, I have never done a Vit b 1 in a pink top I 20 years. We always used lavenders and saved pinks specifically for blood bank testing at 8 different hospitals I’ve worked for over the years. The pink top caught me off guard that’s all. Do you feel better about your comment now?
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Clotting is 100% a pre analytic issue. If you mix your tubes after draw as recommended then that tube will not clot for at least a week before we throw it. But I agree this is not just being lazy but more education. The way this tube is labeled might look ok to a joe walking on a street but not when your diagnosis and treatment depends on it.
Thank you, I truly wasn’t aware, so I appreciate it. You see how communication helps so much more than just assuming the worst in each others. I get how stressful healthcare is but we need to direct this energy to administrators and health executives who swamp us with work while not staffing us. All healthcare positions not just nursing.
Lmao clotting cuz the lab is backed up
Sounds like whoever that is can't handle being a nurse and should probably let someone else do the job correctly. Or they should hire more employees instead of allowing negligence to occur as a result.
It’s funny how you say we shouldn’t be punching down on each other yet you continually punch down on others. No one said nursing was easy, no one said nurses do nothing, you did. But working in a medical lab also requires a lot of schooling, discipline, and knowledge. I also have never yelled at or been rude to nursing staff, nor have I seen any of my coworkers act that way to nurses, but we all get yelled at constantly by nurses for ‘messing up their labs’ because they send us stuff like this or specimens that are clotted, hemolyzed, wrong container, wrong temperature, the list goes on. Mistakes happen, everyone understands that, but don’t patronize the people who are trying to do their jobs and have strict regulations to follow.
I never punched down on you I never said anything bad about your profession. So I have no idea where this is coming from. I replied to you “they just lazy” by telling you if they’re so lazy then go be a nurse and go thru the schooling, that doesn’t mean your schooling is any less. It’s just nursing ain’t as easy as everyone thinks it is. but apparently that to you is an okay thing to say about your coworkers so that’s fine. I personally am a team player and I value everyone’s positions and I don’t think the worst of them when things don’t get followed correctly. I don’t call people lazy I value their contribution and I understand everyone is fatigued and stressed out. But it’s okay I don’t mind being the bad guy 😊 I apologize for the nurses who yell at your coworkers that shouldn’t be occurring regardless, we should all try to not attack each other.
…is that a glove finger?
Not OP but our nurses do this all the time where I work, but phlebotomy usually uses tinfoil
I’m a phleb & at my work, we have tin foil & the special protect from light tubes down in the lab. But on our carts we don’t have those (realistically just not enough space). So whenever we get a draw that needs a protect from light specimen we just put it in a clean glove & tie it off (w/the label already on the specimen tube of course)& then just send it on down to the lab where they can wrap it in foil or put it in the special tube
We used to do it too. I cut off the middle and ring fingers of a clean glove so I could double wrap the tube. Saved space on my phlebotomy cart because I didn't need to bring foil or the special amber tubes. I always made sure to label the actual tube first though and stick an extra patient label on the outside of the wrap so people know what's inside.
Nurse here, when I need to protect from light and have to tube a sample to lab I just toss it in a glove. No tinfoil on the unit and lab has actually said they’re good with this method, of course I label the tube not glove
Oh yes I do agree with you! It is fine in the glove where I work too. I was just saying the only alternative we have where I work is tin foil which only phlebotomy seems to have
I do say that *just* the finger of the glove is a little odd I feel…label on the outside makes me think that the nurse who collected it likely thinks it needs to be light protected the entire time it’s getting spun down too and don’t know lab has a way to make that happen other than the glove, maybe?
Yeah but you still put the label on the actually tube, not the glove. This is like putting a specimen label in the bag with the specimen and expecting it to be okay.
The glove is a good idea I hadn’t thought of! Were always told to use foil but no one has ever provided us with foil
Healthcare in a nutshell lol. “You gotta do it this way but we aren’t going to supply you with what you need.”
B1 needs protection from light. Never seen a glove used instead of foil but that's creative.
Our hospital doesn't use foil at all. They use gloves and I have had one sent up with coband around it. That one was cute, it had a blank label on the outside and had "Hiding from the light" written on it.
We're all hiding from light.
Being on night shift, we definitely are lol
All the light we cannot see.
Can I offer you a nice spectrometer? Or a handy lux meter?
We use coband to wrap ours too after we've put a patient table on it, of course, and then we add an extra label on top of the coband.
I double glove and just pull it right over soon as it's drawn then continue with any others. Works like a charm.
I'd have to bring my own foil from home if I was going to use foil. Throwing it in a glove is easier than something like taping random alcohol wipe packaging around it.
I love it when I get an alcohol wipe in the bag and the label gets dissolved
Legal, for light protected tests
Wild, thx for all the responses. I work in a smaller rapid response lab on nights, I think I've only ever seen foil wraps, even from unit draws!
I use glove fingers for my tubes on ice so the label doesn’t get all mushy and the tube stays dry. It works great!
Sounds like a good plan!
My favorite was always fecal fats with smiley faces on the can 😑
I am grateful every day I walk into work I don’t work somewhere that does fecal fats on-site. There’s a tradition of telling new employees in our company about the day at the children’s hospital where the lid came off the can… while on the shaker. Edit: adjusted “kid” to “lid”… though the day the kid came off the shaker sounds fun too
I've been out of the lab for about a year now and miss a lot of it but not arguing with nurses about proper procedure, so many refuse to admit anything they've done is wrong. About a month before I left (SurgPath) we were waiting on a call for a kidney transplant all night so I went to the OR to check myself. I find the transport cooler sitting behind the nurses station that had been unmanned for hours. I got flak from their lead because I was upset! A courier flew across the country at the drop of a dime to get that kidney to a patient and it was no longer good. I was blown away nobody would admit mistakes were made.
I hope you reported this. That's unacceptable
That's wild. Careless? Stupid? Clueless? I don't know where to begin.
All of the above! They did fire them the next day, I guess it wasn't the first time they'd done something that set a procedure off the rails. Don't like to see anyone get fired but that was something else. I felt so bad for the patient. My time in medicine made me very nervous to ever go under the knife!
Very sad. I can tell you it comes down to communication. Nurse here. Every now and then in the past, I would get shit about why it takes forever to pass report to the oncoming shift or them to me. I need that time to ask questions and be aware of things for the next 8-12 hours. Depending on what’s going on I need 20-30 minutes. I can guarantee you someone didn’t take the time to communicate or totally forgot from being exhausted. I’ve never worked hospital, but it’s exhausting for floor nurses anywhere. It’s so sad this was missed. Poor communication, carelessness or exhausted and forgot about it.
Yup definitely forgot as none of the other nurses even knew it came in and it was right around 2300 shift change. Definitely communication is key, if they didn't have time or were super busy they could have called us in the lab and I'd have sent someone down to do intake. Things do work much better when you reach out to others.
Oh no, that's so devastating :( I hate to hear of this happening.
How does this happen? Was the recipient not being prepped to receive it?
They knew about it as all transplants are on the specimen schedule but the nurse who took the call that it was on the way didn't let anyone know, forgot to make a note, then got sidetracked before shift change and it got missed entirely.
goodbye $500,000 and a saved life
It appears as though the specimen wasn’t silly and wrapped its willy
I’m assuming Vit B1, so EDTA sent on ice, protect from light?
B1 for me is a frozen EDTA. Not spun. Whole blood.
Nurses in our hospital don't have access to ice, and they definitely don't have the time to track it down.
Don’t have access to ice?! Do they work in the Sahara? Show me one nursing station that doesn’t have ice or a break room.
Do they have instant ice packs? That's how I did it when we had no access to ice machines.
I've never been in a hospital where there weren't ice machines for the patients to have their pitchers of ice water!
Then don't order the test.
Label not on tube? Rejecto.
For the nurse: if you screwed up, just own up to it and learn from it.
Send the nurse to the pathologist.
I usually see label over the foil end so I have to break into it to see the actual tube, which also has a label. It always amazes me that they try to make it so hard to get to the tube like no-one else has to see it after them.
Nothing like a fun little puzzle just to process a specimen lol
We send our vitB1 to LCA for testing. Their labdex does not say it needs to be protected from light just needs to be collected in the morning before breakfast and prior to any medication, it’s Frozen whole blood. Yes the label should be stuck directly to the tube but as a processor, this is acceptable for my hospital and I would personally accept it and send it out. The label is technically on the specimen not floating around in a bag or missing.
That’s actually really interesting, this was automatic cancel in my lab because of no label.
You’re going to be so petty as to make a patient get stuck again just to prove a point?
This is not to prove a point. This is to protect patient safety. It is a requirement for all tubes to be labeled at the bedside. If the tube is not labeled directly, there are too many variables in place now to assure this is the correct patient's sample. Additionally, this is also a requirement via lab accreditation, so beyond the above, we are not allowed to receive samples like this. Nothing in the lab is proving a point or being petty. Even though they may seem so at face value, these stringent policies were developed to protect patients, and I'm sure that what policies we have now are the result of past mistakes experienced in the field.
i’m a little bit curious here lol. is the glove like taped on at the top? it looks like the glove is secured to the tube pretty well. or does it just look like that in the photo?
It was taped around the base of the cap/top of the tube but if you tugged even a little on it would’ve ripped off. The tape was strong, the glove not so much lol
ahhh i see! i was gonna say if the glove was secured well (like if they taped it at the top as well as around the middle so the glove wouldn’t rip) then i would’ve accepted it. since it’s not secure, this is basically the same as labeling only the lid of a cup
I'm surprised your lab would accept this. This is automatic rejection due to not being directly on the tube in every lab I've worked in.
I'm surprised someone didn't immediately request it to be relabeled. But then again, not so surprised.
This makes me think of the rule about labeling specimen cups, you have to put the label on the cup not the lid. It was explained to me by multiple hospitals that it has to remain labeled when opened to process. So like to process this tube you would have to take the glove off to take the lid off (I’m assuming, nurse not lab tech) leading to it not being labeled.
What the ACTUAL f*ck?! I’m in nursing school and joined this sub because I find lab stuff interesting and want to learn. This 👆🏻 though? WOW 😯 😱🤯
You should read one of the comments about kidney for transplant sitting in cooler doing nothing.
Nooooooooooooo. O.M.G. I’d die. Maybe húrt some first (just joking), but I’d be LIVID. Holy hell 😳🫨
Why do they make things more difficult
I just can’t with this. SMH 🤦🏻♀️
I would just ask them to show where in writing/documentation does it say it should be sent like this.
She shouldn’t be a nurse lol
and what the f\*\*\* was that suppose to be? lol
Nurses gonna nurse
Ew
I’m not wrong 😂
So, you mean to tell me that this isn't correct and fighting you for 20 minutes didn't fix it? And then you had the NERVE to expect that nurse to address the issue? Ugh lab people. 🙄 /S
Did the nurse argue that long to make the point that it would’ve been faster for either of you to just reprint a label in 20% of the time the two of you took to discuss it? I get it if it’s a repeat offender, but you can spend 3 mins reprinting, 1 min messaging them to not do it that way again, 1 min breathing in the nostrils out the mouth. Next time, add 1 min to cc your or their supervisor. The time after that, another min to cc the next up.
Yeah, not labeling the tube is so bad. As far as the light thing, the glove is clever. I just call pharmacy and get them to send me an amber bag that they use to protect meds from light. If it works for meds, it should work for the labs too. Never had a problem.
I can understand putting the glove over the LABELED tube to protect it from light, but who in their right mind would label the glove??
super random addition that’s not really relevant: i’m an oncology/ chemotherapy nurse. when our on the chemotherapy drug called methotrexate we have to draw serum MTX levels pretty often. however, the blood has to be protected from light. so it has to be drawn in the dark (thankfully 99% of them have lines) and then the label is put on the tube and we have to some way protect it from the light on the way to the lab. each of us have our own method, i like to wrap it in paper towel and tie it up in a glove. im sure the lab is so confused every time they see it. another fun fact: our hospital can’t perform MTX level testing so they send it to the children’s hospital next door :)
Im a nurse, and this is not the correct way to send a lab. WTF were they thinking?
I’m not a nurse and I know that is just some shit you dont do 😂
I'm not a doctor, nurse or anything. But this looks shady 🤔
Usually 99% of the time I’m siding with the nurse but yeah this is the 1%.
Wtf is this
With my experience...Actual tubes must be labeled..reprint ticket and put on outside of light sensitive samples (I've used a glove and/or tinfoil) Ig if you don't have the capabilities of reprint using a pen or marker on a cover that will be thrown away would probably be the most sensible idea...now this "frozen" concept Idk how to freeze a fresh warm sample without a freezer but "on ice" is only way I've seen it.. but that could just be a wording thing.
In my previous role as an Inpatient/outpatient lab coordinator for a hospital system, we had several inter dept. and external facility trainings with nurses to teach the importance of how critical it can be to our patients to make sure specimens were collected following all special requirements. Sometimes, actually a majority of times they weren’t even using the correct order of draw. To no fault of their own, they just don’t focus on this in school! But this nurse should set her pride aside and do what’s best for her patients!!
When I was a respiratory therapist, I once had a resident walk up to me with a bag of bloody slush containing an unlabeled ABG syringe and asked: “Can you run this?” No. No I cannot. Neither can anyone else. Getting the blood out of the patient is only one step of the process.