Advanced Practice Nursing Intervention Plan for
Gastrointestinal Hemorrhage, Unspecified
The patient has a heme positive test, which means that there is blood contaminate in his stool sample. This result indicates that he may be suffering from gastrointestinal (GI) hemorrhage or gastrointestinal (GI) bleeding. According to NIDDK (2016), gastrointestinal (GI) bleeding is any type of bleeding in digestive tract. There are two type of GI bleeding: upper GI bleeding and lower GI bleeding (Buttaro et al, 2013). Signs of upper GI bleeding include coffee ground emesis, hemoptysis, tarry stool; whereas, signs of lower GI bleeding such as dark or tarry stool or dark blood or bright red blood mixed in stool (National Library of Medicine, 2016). Other signs include abdominal pain or cramping, dizziness, generalized weakness, and …show more content…
Taking a personal and family medical history as well as a history of presenting symptoms such as if he observes any blood in his stool, gets tired easily, or feels pain in abdominal area. Vital signs are taken because the signs of GI bleeding can manifest via abnormality of vital sign such as tachycardia and hypotension due to volume depletion (Buttaro et al., 2013). A through physical examination is performed including auscultation, percussion, and palpitation on all abdominal quadrants.
2. Investigating his medication regimen including over-the-counter medications. Some over-the-counter medications can cause GI bleeding such as ibuprofen and naproxen.
3. Prescribing lab tests; these include repeat fecal occult blood test (FOBT) three times to make sure that there is blood from GI tract in stool samples; CBC with platelet count can determine the hemoglobin and hematocrit level, which can indicate whether or not this patient is anemic; CMP to evaluate electrolyte, BUN, creatinine, liver function; coagulation studies (APTT, PT, INR); and H. pylori screening (Buttaro et al,