Venous Blood Sampling

Aka: Venous Blood Sampling, Venous Blood Draw, Phlebotomy, Blood Test Venipuncture, Blood Collection Tube

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II. Preparations

  1. Tubes without Anticoagulant
    1. Red Top Tube
    2. Red (Barrier Vacuum Tube)
  2. Tubes with Anticoagulant
    1. Purple Top Tube (Lavender)
    2. Blue Top Tube
    3. Green Top Tube
    4. Grey Top Tube
    5. Yellow Top Tube
    6. Navy Blue Top Tube (Royal Blue Top Tube)

III. Technique: Blood Draw from an IV

  1. General Process
    1. Apply Tourniquet above the IV site
    2. Unlock the IV and attach a vacutainer
    3. Apply gentle traction to IV while attaching a specimen tube to the vacutainer
    4. Draw first 2-3 ml of blood (dilute sample) and dispose
      1. Alternatively draw 2-3 ml via syringe before attaching vacutainer
    5. Collect needed specimen tubes
    6. Flush IV line well after blood draw
  2. Troubleshooting small vein IV draws
    1. Negative pressure from vacuum tube may collapse the vein
    2. Flush the IV line well prior to blood draw
    3. Use a 3 ml syringe to draw blood and then inject or drip into specimen tubes
  3. Efficacy compared with venipuncture
    1. High Parity (95%) between lab values via IV draw versus venipuncture
    2. Hemolysis may occur slightly more with IV draws (and increased Serum Potassium levels)
    3. Elevated Lactic Acid levels may occur with small IVs

IV. References

  1. Swaminathan and Fisher (2025) Drawing from the IV, EM:Rap, 5/5/2025
  2. Lesser (2020) JRSM Open 11(5):2054270419894817 +PMID: 32523703 [PubMed]

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Related Topics in Hematology and Oncology

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