Braun dialysis machine

hi

ive just started a new job in a dialysis unit as a staff nurse & so far i am really enjoying it. However i’m beginning to wonder if i’m cut out for al the techinical stuff?? I set up the brauns & wondered by some miracle if anyone know if i’d be able to get some sort of step by step booklet of putting on & taking of patients???i am picking bits up but just thought i’d ask…

thanks very much

pleazzzzzzzz?

Unregistered, this is a site for home, not in-center dialysis. A couple of thoughts for you:
1). Contact BBraun, there should be a manual specific to that machine.
2). Your center may have a step-by-step guide; perhaps for techs.
3). Check out the Core Curriculum for the Dialysis Technician. You can download the new, updated version from the Medical Education Institute website (http://www.meiresearch.org). There is a lot of good, updated info in it.

[QUOTE=Unregistered;12456]hi

ive just started a new job in a dialysis unit as a staff nurse & so far i am really enjoying it. However i’m beginning to wonder if i’m cut out for al the techinical stuff?? I set up the brauns & wondered by some miracle if anyone know if i’d be able to get some sort of step by step booklet of putting on & taking of patients???i am picking bits up but just thought i’d ask…

thanks very much[/QUOTE]
Your dialysis clinic should have a training program for all staff nurses to assure that they are competent and confident in their ability to provide a safe and comfortable treatment for patients. This usually includes reading about kidney disease and dialysis. Then you should have a preceptor that you follow along behind as he/she assesses and treats patients, and then you’ll assessing patients and run the dialysis treatment yourself while your preceptor watches you. Finally, when training is completed and you’re judged to be competent, you’ll run patients independently. It’s a step-by-step process and is pretty much the way that patients are trained to do their own treatment – by reading, watching, doing.

Make sure that the dialysis clinic you where you work gives you enough time to learn what you’re need to know before you’re pushed to take care of patients. The patients want to know that their nurse knows what they’re doing. After all, their dialysis access is their “lifeline” so in a dialysis clinic where patients often know little about caring for themselves, you and your co-workers hold their lives in your hands. It’s an awesome responsibility and I’m glad that you’re taking it seriously.

blow it out your ass beth she can learn and she is a staff nurse it does not mean she is working the dialysis floor she could be giving meds or charge she is just looking for extra help try not to be such a nazi

I’m not sure what you took offense at and really don’t appreciate being called a Nazi. I intended my posting to offer suggestions to a nurse who apparently felt uncomfortable taking on more responsibility than he/she felt competent to handle. If you read the initial post, he/she described himself/herself as a “staff nurse” who set up B Braun machines. He/she asked for a step-by-step manual for putting on and taking off patients. In every dialysis clinic where I’ve worked, staff nurses put patients on and take patients off. I’ve never worked in a clinic where a nurse just passed meds. If this person was a charge nurse, as you suggest, he/she would need to be licensed, experienced in dialysis, and know how to do everything related to patient care in the dialysis clinic including taking orders from physicians and handling any emergency that might arise.

The ESRD regulations require that the governing body of a dialysis clinic assure that all staff meet the qualifications for the job and have orientation to the functions that they are to perform and an opportunity for continuing education. The goal is to assure that staff are competent to provide quality care to patients. If a clinic hires unqualified staff and doesn’t provide the training they need to operate the equipment and care for patients, that facility is at risk of being cited by Medicare and having to develop a plan of correction to resolve the deficiency or lose Medicare funding and be closed.

Finally, if you’d read my last sentence, you would have seen that I thanked the nurse for taking his/her job seriously and wanting to learn. It is a huge responsibility to care for people who are on dialysis and some people do not take it as seriously as I believe they should.

Unregistered, generally we would delete posts like yours that contain no information and do nothing but gripe (in foul language). You are welcome to disagree with us, but keep your tone civil or we will delete the message in the future.

From a patients pov. There is no harm in asking for a draft in writing. An instruction manual for self caring patients might be a start. My ‘self care competency’ checklist is based on a nursing assesment, edited by my nurse for my purposes & to asses me.

The very technical side of things can be left to the technicians but you should know the basics, lining & programming the machines correctly, connecting & disconnecting.
Clinical hygiene & disposal of sharps/waste. Some of the above are in your nursing training. It is daunting. I’ve seen nurses being trained in my unit struggling to do what they’ve just been told by the Matron. Make your own notes & ask questions.
If it’s any consolation the nurses at my unit don’t like the BBrauns much. We have those & a few Gambro AK 95 & 200S machines!

I’d rather have a nurse who’s asked a lot of questions & knows the ropes then someone who’s struggling with what he/she is doing:) Not aimed at you personally but you get my point.

I know units differ in different countries, but variety is the spice of life, or so they say!

J

[QUOTE=Beth Witten MSW ACSW;12464]Your dialysis clinic should have a training program for all staff nurses to assure that they are competent and confident in their ability to provide a safe and comfortable treatment for patients. This usually includes reading about kidney disease and dialysis. Then you should have a preceptor that you follow along behind as he/she assesses and treats patients, and then you’ll assessing patients and run the dialysis treatment yourself while your preceptor watches you. Finally, when training is completed and you’re judged to be competent, you’ll run patients independently. It’s a step-by-step process and is pretty much the way that patients are trained to do their own treatment – by reading, watching, doing.

Make sure that the dialysis clinic you where you work gives you enough time to learn what you’re need to know before you’re pushed to take care of patients. The patients want to know that their nurse knows what they’re doing. After all, their dialysis access is their “lifeline” so in a dialysis clinic where patients often know little about caring for themselves, you and your co-workers hold their lives in your hands. It’s an awesome responsibility and I’m glad that you’re taking it seriously.[/QUOTE]
Dear Beth;
Perhaps you have not worked at a Davita unit. I have dialyzed at three different
Davita units over an 8 1/2 year period and in all three the TECHS put the patients on and take them off and here in CO the techs are not certified although that is supposed to change beginning in 2009. That is one of the reasons why I have been sticking myself for the last eight years. I now have button hole sites established. One new nurse now in training has no previous dialysis experience. The machine training is being done by a tech w/2 years experience. I have dialyzed out of state twice while on vacation, two weeks in Wyoming and two weeks in Idaho(not Davita units) and in both places the nurses DID do the"duties" so to speak, but at Davita units, from my experience, due to staffing
levels the nurses have little time to do more than give meds and check machine set-up, often after the patient has running for awhile.
In all but one of seven units I have dialysed at the staff asked if they could watch because they had never seen a patient self-cannulate.
(oops-wrong quote-was referring to the post where you said you had never worked at a unit where the nurses did NOT put patients on and take them off.)
Sorry about posting this in HHD forum.
I have been reading these forums for some time(and am impressed w/the work
you and DORI and others are doing) and recently registered but have been unable to Post Reply etc. when logged in.

At my old centre (DSI) the nurses would do the duty of techs when they were still in training, but once the training was finished the nurses rarely, if ever put patients on and take them off. In my current centre (Davita) I believe all the “nitty gritty” stuff is done by the techs (I’m a home patient so I rarely see what’s going on in the in-centre).

I’m a little confused/curious. In my unit the techs deal with the machines, servicing, sorting out faults etc. The nurses, & healthcare assistants do the putting on/taking off, although there’s a low dependancy unit where the patients do most stuff themselves, under supervision. IE there a nurse or 2 there to help if needed.
Everything else, provision of food & drink & cleaning is contracted out to private contract.

remenber its, team work at the clinc. the pct and the nurse work together as one

[QUOTE=Unregistered;12456]hi

ive just started a new job in a dialysis unit as a staff nurse & so far i am really enjoying it. However i’m beginning to wonder if i’m cut out for al the techinical stuff?? I set up the brauns & wondered by some miracle if anyone know if i’d be able to get some sort of step by step booklet of putting on & taking of patients???i am picking bits up but just thought i’d ask…

thanks very much[/QUOTE]
hope you find the imformation you need I also dont know if I am cut out for this job but i will try my best I dont feel I am been given enough time to learn as an auxilliry feel under presure

If you are a nurse or patient care technician you should receive training about the equipment your clinic uses and dialysis procedures as well as facility policies and procedures. You will need to be able to show that you can perform the functions of your job safely before you provide direct patient care unsupervised. If you’re a technician you will have 18 months from your hire date to pass one of the certification exams offered by a CMS-approved organization. If you want to read up on dialysis, you can find a lot of information in the Core Curriculum for the Dialysis Technician, which is a good source of information for either nurses or technicians:
http://www.meiresearch.org/core_curriculum.php

hi,
i am recently join nursing home as supporting assistant for hemodialysis machine of b braun diapact +
, during disinfection machine shows message "LF too low " so how to troubleshoot it.

plz help…

Anyone who is a helper for a dialysis patient should have been trained to operate the equipment and address problems that arise before, during, and after treatment. This includes training on how to disinfect the dialysis machine. The nursing home should have an RN who was trained to run the machine who should be the one to troubleshoot error messages. Ask for his/her help. If the patient is a home dialysis patient who does dialysis in a nursing home, the home training nurse at that the patient’s dialysis facility (number should be on the patient’s chart) or the clinical or technical staff at B Braun (800-854-6851) should be able to help the trained nurse troubleshoot the alarm if he/she can’t remember how. There should also be an manual onsite that lists error messages and how to troubleshoot them.

I have been doing dialysis now for many years. It takes some time to learn the mechanics of dialysis. A good preceptor know this and realizes that he/she will need to repeat things several times. It is the unusual things that cause the most frustration in our work such as a bad catheter, difficult fistula, clotting dialyzer or unstable patient. Remember the tubing from the patient to the blood pump is running at a negative pressure (if a leak occurs you will suck air into your extracoporeal system) and all the tubing after the blood pump is at a positive pressure (if a leak occurs you will leak out blood). We need more HD nurses. The B Braun operators manual should help. Good luck with the crazy symbols.

                                                                                            Jack