What is a “blown” vein when getting an IV and how is it not harmful?
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A blown vein is a vein that has either ruptured or is not patent enough to be used to deliver medicine
Veins carry blood back to the heart and are fairly low pressure pipes so the risk of bleeding out is low as your body will plug the leak before a lot gets out. There are also collateral veins so if one is blocked theres another that can carry blood back to the heart.
Its not harmless as you are still bleeding out inside and now you have to find another access, but not the end of the world.
Dont blow a vein when doing a central line, though.
It happened to me. It’s a ruptured vein, often caused by the needle being pushed right through the vein to the other side, instead of the tip of the needle stopping inside the vein.
You get a big bruise. Any internal bleeding causes a bruise. That’s why you get a bruise when your flesh is hit really hard by something; blood vessels rupture. It is usually not harmful, it’s like any other bruise. In my case the nurse just found a vein in the other arm.
It means the vein ruptured, usually due to a pressure difference collapsing the vein so blood can’t flow easily. Veins are pretty small and don’t carry a huge amount of blood at any one time. The only *dangerous* part is bruising, and you’ll need to get stuck again.
Things usually sound worse than they are in the hospital. Everyone gets a blown vein at some point from dehydration, illness, small veins, shrinkage, etc,. If it was a concern, they would do a lot more than give you a bandage and try a different vein.
I guess there are very, very rare cases if your blood doesn’t clot well that the bleeding could last a while, but with pressure, the blow out will not be able to release that much blood on its own.
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