Posted on 08/23/2010 5:02:24 PM PDT by Jessica2677
http://www.inviromedical.com/SAFETYRESOURCES/WhattoDoifYouGetaNeedleStick/tabid/230/Default.aspx
Great resource, thank you for posting this! From the link:
What to Do if You've Had a Needle Stick InjuryNeedle stick safety should always be a priority. The following suggested steps regarding how to handle a needle stick injury were first published in the American Journal of Nursing.1 Step One – Clean the Wound Step Two – Testing Step Three – Report the Incident Step Four – Retesting Where to Go for More Information on Needle Stick SafetyCall the Clinicians Hotline The hotline s clinicians are needle stick safety experts, and they will help assess the risk of the exposure, discuss the most recent post-exposure prophylaxis protocols, and review specific treatment and follow-up options The number to call is 1.888.448.4911. For more information visit www.ucsf.edu/hivcntr/Hotlines/PEPline.html |
If this was a crime scene...and CSI was investigating...could they test the remnants to determine if tainted blood was put on the lancet to kill a person..or is that just TV show mumbo jumbo?
Wouldn’t there be a value is knowing the other patients tested that day.
There would be value in knowing if any diseased people were stuck that day.
He appears to be saying that if you had no clue who was there that day..you couldn’t get tracers for disease off the lancet.
It is a little confusing.
I take it to mean...the tech used the lancet on one daughter to do an iron test.
the other daughter picked it up and noticed the dried blood . Not sure why the other daughter would pick it up ..maybe she noticed something odd looking on it before she picked it up.
Mother is worried about the first daughter who was pricked with a used lancet.
A forensics lab can do incredible things. A medical testing lab will decline to test if the tube isn’t filled to the top. Unfortunately we have to deal with the medical testing labs. I suppose if you wanted to pay a few grand, you could get a private lab to do PCR testing on residue, it would come back weeks to late for medical decisions though.
You still couldn’t identify the lancet in a sharps container, and opening up a container and digging around is frowned upon by OSHA.
Ahh but they know who was there, or they should. Of course their track record is pretty bad.
HIV and Hepatitis titers are done on relatively large volumes of intact blood. A forensics lab can find and identify trace amounts of DNA or RNA but would not be clinically useful because of the delay and could easily cost a million + dollars if you were to test a sharps container full of lancets.
Just knowing if there were any people at high risk for hepatitis or HIV tested that day would be enough to make the needed medical decisions.
The biggest problem here is not the disposal of the lancet, it is the doctor not taking charge and doing everything possible to mitigate the risk.
It doesn't matter that it's too early, you need contemporary evidence and documentation.
Yes, odds are that she'll be fine. However, it's not certain. No tellin' where that instrument was...or who it was in.
>>Don’t waste your time trying to track down the lancet, there is no way to identify which one it was and even if you did, there is no way to test the residue for disease.<<
It depends on how many are in the box.
If there had been 10 patients, it’s pretty easy to find the kid’s DNA. That would be only if a lawsuit happened.
Personally, I would go for patient records.
There is no reason to contact an attorney. Most needle sticks (>99%) don’t result in any infection. Go to the doctor’s office and he/she would be reasonable enough to pay for the testing.
I’m no expert in lab testing but I spent a couple of days calling around trying to get residue in a syringe tested a few years back and was told, that as the treating doctor, there was nowhere I could send it for testing. My only option was to do follow up testing on the person that received the exposure. Things may have changed, but I was told there was no way to get residue tested for HIV outside of a research lab and no, don’t bother asking.
As far as her getting medical records with confidential information about other patients especially HIV, a disease with its own civil rights, not very likely. An ER doctor calling the doctor directly about any people with elevated risk in a general way, is the best you are going to do. If you knew specifically who the lancet was used on previously, you could ask them to be tested but you cannot force them to be tested.
If a lawsuit happened, the evidence of harm would be a negative baseline test with a documented conversion along with an ER chart documenting the exposure. I guess a slimy lawyer could claim the child was an IV drug user or impune their chastity but that would more than likely piss of a jury. God forbid, and I am using that term as a prayer, not an invective, the child converted, the doctor has already done enough to enrage a jury.
Malpractice is not CSI territory. All you have to do is prove duty, negligence and harm. The duty is self evident if she is a patient getting blood drawn. Negligence is also self evident if they are using dirty equipment to draw blood, of course they are going to deny that it happened, thus the importance in going to the ER and getting everything documented in the medical record. Harm would be proved by seroconversion. You would not need to prove that an HIV person ever walked into the clinic just as the doctor could not defend their self by providing records showing they never had an HIV positive person.
It would take a lawyer to help figure out if their were harm if there were no seroconversion. I honestly think it vary state by state. It’s been years since I took a medical legal class, but back then I don’t think you could sue over fear of future disease if there were no disease found but I believe that has changed in a few states over the last ten years.
There is a pending case here in Nevada where reuse of invasive devices were used. I can't cite it just yet but legal action is being taken. In any case this should not panic anyone. This sort of thing is rare.
“Hearing from the gov’t will make him act responsibly . “
Hearing that makes my skin crawl but unfortunately many people will not act responsibly without big brother sitting over their shoulder.
Let us know how things turn out.
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