View Full Version : Chest Tube Difficulty
I've recently been having issues loading the chest tube fluid from the hanging IV bag through the mannequin. After checking the IV bag itself to make sure it wasn't clogged, I changed the check valve that goes directly into the rack.
Any other check valves/trouble spots I should look for in order to correct?
Thank you
wwilkinson
10-07-2008, 03:08 PM
Are you using clear fluid (sterile or distilled water) or water with red food dye or commercially available simulated blood products? Too thick of mixtures scan clog the system, so you may want to flush through completely with just the sterile or distilled water. Other steps to ensure are:
Make sure the chest tube priming tube is in far enough to engage the valve inside the mannequin.
Set the chest tube enable parameter to prime, once the chest tube is flowing, set the chest tube enable parameter to disable.
If you continue to have issues with this feature, please contact our customer support center, who can walk you through checking your system.
1-866-462-7920 or email at support@meti.com
Wendy Jo
Clinical Educator, METI
Thank you for your response. I'm using a yellow-tinged fluid and changed the check valve that goes into the rack. I just wanted to know if there were other check valves that could be clogged that I can change. I believe the chest tube hose in the chest is in deep enough.
mlivingston
02-18-2009, 01:57 PM
I also had that problem but resolved it by pushing air with a 60cc luerlock syringe multiple times thru the tube on the back of the rack that connects to the IV bag. This along with making sure that the chest tube was in far enough to engage the valve made a huge difference and it worked fine after that.
Hi there-a couple of questions that may help out
1. have you used the feature before with no problems? sometimes in the distal end of the actual chest tube insertion mechanism you run into a bit of resistance which normally goes away after using a few times
2. more importantly what size chest tube are you using? if you are using one that is too small invariably you will not get flow, nor will you be able to prime effectively
please let me know-hope this helps!