During a busy shift, you note that the chart of your newly admitted patient has few orders for medications and diagnostic tests, taken by telephone by another nurse. You were on the way to the patient's room to do your assessment when the unit secretary tells you that one of the orders reads as follows: “Lasix, 20 mg, stat.” What should you do first? How do you go about giving this drug? Explain.
Because this is a newly admitted patient, the nurse should first perform an assessment before giving any medications. However, because the order is “stat” (meaning “give immediately”), this assessment has to be a brief, focused assessment. Assess the patient's vital signs (blood pressure, pulse, respirations, temperature) and level of consciousness. Check for signs of fluid retention (pedal edema), ask about urine output and function, and listen to breath and heart sounds. Also, assess for drug allergies and other drug reactions. However, this stat order is missing something—the route. Never assume the route via which a medication is to be given. Even though this patient was just admitted and may or may not have an intravenous line, it is important to clarify the route by which this drug should be given. The order was a telephone order taken by another nurse, so you can ask that nurse whether a route was specified when she spoke to the physician. If not, the physician must be contacted right away for clarification. To streamline the process, the order can be checked by another nurse while you are performing the assessment.