NR 304 Week 5 Annie LaDuke; Pre-Briefing Questions

Annie LaDuke: Pre-Briefing Questions Hannah Walsh Chamberlain University College of Nursing NR304: Health Assessment II Professor Kansal March 9th, 2025 Annie LaDuke: Pre-Briefing Questions Deep vein Thrombophlebitis, also known as DVT, is something that occurs when a clot forms in either one or more veins. Typically, the clots are formed in the lower extremities, most commonly the legs (Jarvis & Eckhardt, 2024). When patients are suffering from DVT they can experience a cramping pain. Deep Vein Thrombophlebitis Diagnosis When assessing a patient’s peripheral vascular system, the things you will assess are a patient’s pulse for regularity, force and equality bilateral. In addition, the patient should be assessed for edema and palpated for temperature (Jarvis & Eckhardt, 2024). Some predisposing factors of DVT are obesity, someone who has recently had surgery, pregnancy, smoking, age, family history, or someone using birth control (Jarvis & Eckhardt, 2024). When discussing diagnostic testing and what labs and tests are performed to diagnose DVT one should start with the venous doppler. The venous doppler is used to help visualize blood flow and to determine if there is a clot or blockage present. Moving onto labs, the D-dimer which is used to check for fibrin degradation present in the blood and the normal lab value is <250 ng/ml (Pagana, Pagana, & Pagana, 2020). The next lab run is an INR which is to assess how long it takes blood to clot with the typical value for blood clotting time is 1.0 (Pagana, Pagana, & Pagana, 2020). The PT test is used to assess for potential clotting issues such as a DVT and the typical safe lab value is 11-13.5 seconds (Pagana, Pagana, & Pagana, 2020). PTT test is used to assess the intrinsic system and clotting formation with the lab value of 60-70 seconds. Hematocrit is to measure the total blood volume and the safe range in males is 0.42-0.52 and in women is 0.37-0.47 (Pagana, Pagana, & Pagana, 2020). Lastly, the platelets blood test is run to see how much clotting is taking place in the blood 150,000-400,000/mm 3 (Pagana, Pagana, & Pagana, 2020). The priority nursing diagnosis that will be used in the case of DVT is ineffective tissue perfusion related to DVT as evidence by increased redness and swelling. Pain Assessment Questions When assessing pain in the patient the following questions