Does anyone else have to pull blood clots thru your fistula needles right after cannulating?

Almost every time I cannulate my arterial needle I get good flashback but by the time I get the needle secured in place with the tape it stops pulsing and I then have to put a empty syringe on the end of the tubing and draw back to get the blood to flow free thru the needle and tubing, when doing this I usually pull a blood clot thru the tubing into the syringe . Sometimes it is quite large , it happens mostly on the arterial needle but sometimes on both needles, also I use the dry needling method because when I first started self cannulating I was using the wet method but I was having difficulty seeing the flashback so I tried the dry method and have had no problem seeing the flashback, any advice on this issue would be a great help , thanks .

ok i can help! do you have a upper arm or lower arm fistula? do take blood thinner med? do you have buttonholes are rope ladder cannulation? what type of needles are you using? and do you the wings to cannulated are the tupping?

Stuart Mott, LPN, is a pioneer in buttonhole cannulation, whose articles about Touch Cannulation, Cushion Cannulation, and Tandem Hand cannulation have changed practice. His approach to cleaning buttonholes more safely to improve infection control has now been used for 54,094 cannulation in four countries without a single infection. Stuart is currently working as an acute dialysis nurse in St. Louis, Missouri with DaVita.

I have a lower arm fistula, I use buttonholes and I have the same issue with the nipro fistula needles and the medisystem needles, and I hold the tubing to cannulate, I find holding the tubing is easier for me because I am missing most of my thumb on that hand.

ok when you use touch cannulation does the Tupe bend whil you are c cannulating? do you take blood thinners?

ok in my 26 years of expertise cannulating the reasons blood clots come out is the cannulated before you has scraped the bottom of the vessel wall causing damage the body reposing by trying to heal the scabbing by the use Fibergen which is blood clots so with that said try cannulating very slowly.