Venous blood ooze

I'm trying to reach a stage when I can start my dialysis with as little assistance as possible.

I now do most of it myself. But I've had a couple of incidents which have really unnerved me. When you have 2 hands to do things, it can be easy. But since one of my hands is the one that I'm working on to cannulate, I have only one hand. So, after cannulation, I kind of struggle to put the plasters. And in the process I keep moving the needles.

This caused the venous site to ooze blood twice. On one occasion it was just a little and it stopped very soon. On the other occasion, it oozed a lot. Luckily my tech was there. He removed the plasters, pushed the needle a little and then plastered it quite hard to stop the oozing. I was wondering what would have happened if he was not there.

Now, this normally should not happen. But my fistula is a little weird. The venous access is at right angles to the arterial access and they're very close to each other. This makes it very difficult to plaster the needles once they're in.

This makes me really worried. For me, it is very important to be able to dialyse alone. But with this fistula, it is going to be difficult. I guess practice will make it better. I need to keep persisting.

Comments

billpeckham.com said…
I think you are right that with time it will get better. I am wondering if it would help if you first put a temporary tape in place to hold the line steady and then taped the needle properly; after the needle was properly taped you could then remove the temporary tape.

I have not had oozing since switching to the buttonhole method nearly 7 years ago (I can hardly believe it has been that long) - do you use a numbing agent? That can cause the skin to loose some elasticity.
Anonymous said…
mighty brave!!
just makes me reconsider and think of all the positives .