Why would hospitals use catheters to relieve urine when they are not always needed?

May 24th, 2009 | by Rick |
Caroline asked:


Certain bacterial infections such as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus ( MRSA) is found in hospitals and health care facilities approximately 85% of the time, and is a cause of catheter use. They are now routinely used in birth labor, which doesn’t make sense.

ALEXANDER
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  1. 2 Responses to “Why would hospitals use catheters to relieve urine when they are not always needed?”

  2. By ROLAND on May 27, 2009 | Reply

    FLETCHER

    I havent heard of them being used in Labor and Delivery much unless the person had complications from epidural of not being able to urinate on there own for a while.

    There are many reasons that catheters are used in hospitals. If the person is on strict bedrest and cannot use a bedpan, if the person is incontinent and cant hold urine in and doesnt know when they have to go, if the dr wants strict Intake and output recording it can be difficult to impossible for accuracy if the person uses a hat in the toilet and misses, or again is incontinent. If the person wets the bed and is not cleaned up in timely manner it can lead to irritation of the skin and bed sores faster.

    MRSA is a problem in most hospitals, and so are UTI’s from catheters because when the nurse cleanses the area with betadine and places the catheter it passes through the urethra in both males and females. The bladder is basically sterile and your inserting a foriegn object into it. There is no way for the nurses to clean the urethra since its the tunnel between bladder and outside. That is were the infections come from. While the risk of UTI’s is high the patients are closely monitored for signs of infection and a trained nurse can tell you that the patient is getting and infection by looking at the urine in the bag. A sample is sent and the patients get started antibiotics. Hope this helps.

  3. By ERIN on May 30, 2009 | Reply

    GARY

    I guess it’s to make sure that you go when ye gotta go but yer out. lol

    Does that make any sense. lol

    Have a nice day.

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