What are the facts in this situation?
In cases where a patient is diagnosed with renal failure, it is crucial that dialysis treatment be performed due to the built up waste in the patient’s blood stream causing for them to get sick. It is important that the grafts be readily accessible, and any obstruction can be detrimental to the patient's life.
In the case 23 scenarios, Mr. Cavanaugh was brought into the hospital with a clotted dialysis graft. The patient did not eat that day and was not dialyzed in 4 days. The nurse received the result of the routine blood work that indicated the patient had a high level of potassium. The potassium level alerted the nurse and had called off the surgery. As a vigilant staff, she most likely knew the importance of high level of potassium can be severe to a patient under anesthesia due to the physiology of the heart.
Doctor Jones, the surgeon, was outraged by the decision to call off the surgery. The nurse had stated it was unsafe to send the patient to the operating room due to the high level of potassium. Dr. Jones explained that the patient needed to have the dialysis access fixed in order to lower the potassium level. The longer the patient went without being dialyzed, the more life threatening if could be as the potassium level will only get higher. The normal blood potassium level for an adult is between 3.5 to 5.0 mmol/L. However a patient under hemodialysis it is ideal to be under 5.5 mmol/L, which can be higher