Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Dilaudid

I just gave Dilaudid PO.

Seriously, like 20 minutes ago, right before I walked out the door, I went to help a nurse who was swamped and looked at what the doctor wrote: Dilaudid 2 mg PO.

I didn't know Dilaudid came PO. I went in to give it to the patient, and he said, "are you sure that's Dilaudid? I've never seen it in a pill before." Even my frequent fliers have never seen Dilaudid PO. I've only ever seen it in injectable forms. Is this a new thing or am I just ignorant to the ways of the Gods of the Council of Hydromorphoneus?


4 comments:

Lisa G said...

Actually, we give it all the time to our post-joint replacement patients during the first week or so of rehab. It's the drug of choice for quite a few of our ortho guys. My dad, who's had 3 knee replacements, said it's the only thing that ever touched his pain, for the first week or so. After that, he didn't need anything but Darvocet.

Start bowing to the Gods of the Council of Hydromorphoneus!

miss-elaine-ious said...

Last night I gave not only the regular hydromorph PO, but it comes in 1mg, 2mg, 4mg, and 6mg tabs. AND there are extended release options.

Dosing and route just depends on how quickly you want it to work and how strong you need it to be.

Beth said...

I can't remember now if it was in the ER or one of my admits (though I think it was as I was about to be discharged) that I was given Dilaudid PO. It did just as little as any of the other opioids for my pain level. Oh well. I was suprised just because I had only ever had it IV before, so was expecting an injection and given a pill.

Come to think of it, I think this was after my gall bladder removal, and they were giving it to me to basically prove that I could, in fact, keep stuff down.

cwjsmama said...

We have a pt who has her 12 yo daughter crush her dilaudid and give it to her via picc line. Needless to say, CPS is now involved.