A week of dulls and sharps, needles and pain.

Here is the weekly recap. I started Monday out with a bang. We tried dull needles, in both the upper and lower holes. I tried the lower hole first, and it simply was not going it. I could get in through the skin and tissue, but it wasn't going into the vein. At one point I actually thought I got it in, I felt a pop and the needle moved forward. This was probably just the vein moving out of the way. My nurse then tried her hand at it, and it did the same thing, except this time is scraped the side. If anybody has ever given blood before and they accidentally pierced from the inside of the vein out, it hurts.. a lot. This however was 1000 times that pain, it may have been one of the most painful things I have felt in a long time. We decided at that point to just use a sharp needle in the lower hole. I was able to do this myself and get it right in, even after that immense pain.

After that we moved on to the upper needle, after the problems with the first I was hesitant to try the dull again, especially in the upper hole as this is the one I'm still not 100% comfortable with because it is rather hard to feel. I figured this is something that needs to get done though, and just swallowed my fear and agreed to the dull needle again.

Once again the dull needle was not going in, I tried and the nurse tried but I stopped her because I was simply still jittery about the pain I had just experienced and did not want to risk it again. I took over with a sharp needle and I was able to get in in. Or so I thought.

For the first hour of treatment the veinous pressures were higher than usual, and they kept creeping up. The max pressure that has been deemed safe is 200, and it was now jumping between 200 and 210 at a slow rate (ml/min). It turns out I hadn't inserted the needle into the fistula vein, it was in another vein that ran on top of the fistula vein. The nurse took the needle out.

She decided that she was going to put it pack in in a different spot, just slightly above my normal area. She froze the area with a shot, and then she put it in, and again it ended up in the wrong vein. Next we tried a spot just under my lower hole, she stuck the freezing in. By mistake, because the vein here is right up against the skin, she stuck the freezing into the vein. The freezing needles to be in tissue, not a vein so she could not administer it. She stuck the needle in, and got it right in the correct vein. This was the last needle for the day, but if you are counting that is 8 needles in total in my arm that day. It was not a fun day.

The rest of the week has been fairly uneventful, we have finally started getting dull needles in the upper hole, and we are going to try the lower tomorrow again. Hopefully it goes well.

Owen