Chap 17 Flashcards
Adequate breathing rates
Adult: 12-20
Child: 15-30
Infant: 25-30
Respiratory observations
- Altered mental status
- Unusual anatomy (Barrel chest)
- patients position
- Tripod
- Sitting with feet dangling, leaning forward
Work of breathing, including
- Retractions
- Use of accessory muscle to breath
- Flared nostrils
- Pursed lips
- One-word dyspnea, two-word dyspnea
- Pale, cyanotic, or flushed skin
- Pedal edema
- Sacral edema
- Noisy breathing
- Wheezing
- Gurgling
- Snoring
- Crowing
- Stridor
- Coughing
- SpO2 less than 95%
- Auscultating
- Lung sounds on both sides during inspiration and expiration
Evaluating vital sign changes
- Increased pulse rate
- Decreased pulse rate (especially in infants and children)
- Changes in the breathing rate
- Changes in breathing rhythm
- Hypertension or hypotension
Wheezes
- High pitched sound
- air moving through narrowed air passages in the lungs
- Commonly on exhale
- Common with asthma, emphysema, and chronic bronchitis
Crackles
- fine crackling or bubbling heard on inspiration
- Fluid in the alveoli or by the opening of closed alveoli
- Also called rales
Rhonchi
- Lowered pitched sounds that resemble snoring or rattling
- Secretions in airway
- Seen with pneumonia or bronchitis
- Also when materials are aspirated into the lungs
- Generally louder than crackles
Stridor
- High pitched sound
- heard on inspiration
- Upper airway sound indicating partial obstruction of the trachea or larynx
- Usually audible without a stethoscope
Patient care for breathing difficulty
- Assessment
- Assess airway on primary assessment and throughout call
- Assist respiration with artificial ventilations and supplemental oxygen when patient has inadequate breathing
- Oxygen
- Oxygen is main treatment for respiratory difficulty
Positioning
-Usually sitting position for supplemental oxygen and supine for artificial ventilation
Prescribed inhaler
- May assist with prescribed inhaler
- After medical direction
Continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP)
CPAP
Continuous Positive Airway Pressure
- NPPV- Noninvasive positive pressure ventilation
- Blows oxygen or air continuously at a low pressure into the airway to prevent the alveoli from collapsing at the end of exhalation, and it can also push fluid out of the alveoli back into the capillaries that surround them
CPAP common uses
Pulmonary edema Drownings Asthma COPD- Bronchitis, Emphysema Respiratory failure in some cases
CPAP contraindications
Anatomic-physiologic
- Mental status so depressed that the patient cannot protect his airway or follow instructions,
- lack of a normal spontaneous respiratory rate (CPAP increases the volume of air the patient breathes but doesn’t increase the patients respiratory rate);
- inability to sit up,
- hypotension generally less than 90mmHg
- inability to get and maintain a good mask seal
Pathologic
- Nausea and vomiting
- penetrating chest trauma
- pneumothorax
- shock
- upper gastrointestinal bleeding
- recent gastric surgery
- any condition that would provide a good mask seal (congenital facial malformations, trauma or burns)
Caution
-Claustrophobia and inability to tolerate the mask and seal; history of inability to use CPAP; secretions so copious that they need to be suctioned; and history of pulmonary fibrosis
CPAP heart considerations
When CPAP is being used the pressure in the lungs causes less blood to return to the heart, so cardiac output decreases, resulting in decreased blood pressure if heart cant compensate.
-Systolic blood pressure needs of at least 90mmHg
CPAP considerations/ dangers
- Positive pressure can cause a weak area to rupture in lungs
- BiPAP (bilateral positive airway pressure) is commonly used in hospitals for patients with COPD or Asthma, who are at risk of ruptures in lungs
- Patients at risk of vomiting are positive pressure aspirating into the lungs
- Drying of corneas of the eyes due to bad mask seal`
Two different CPAP machines
Battery powered
- Blows oxygen or air at an adjustable pressure
- Advantage is using only as much oxygen as the patient needs
- Disadvantage- Battery needs to be charged
Venturi principle
- Shaped channels that produce different flow rates
- Advantage is lighter weight and no battery
- Disadvantage is that it used oxygen quickly
CPAP application
- Apply mask or allow patient to hold it on face initially
- Start low level at 2-5 cm H2O
- Assess mental status, vital signs and level of dyspnea frequently
- Raise level if no relief within a few minutes
- Remove if mental status or respiratory conditions deteriorates and use BVM
Types of COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease)
- Emphysema
- Chronic bronchitis
- Black lung