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Caring For Your Suprapubic Catheter: Discharge Instructions

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ID: AND12006
MEDICAL ANIMATION TRANSCRIPT: Please watch the entire video before emptying the urine collection bag or cleaning your catheter. This video will teach you how to empty the urine collection bag attached to your suprapubic catheter and how to clean the catheter. A suprapubic catheter is a thin rubber tube that runs from your bladder through a small incision in your lower abdomen to a bag that collects the urine. A balloon filled with water holds the catheter in place. Caring for your suprapubic catheter involves emptying the collection bag and cleaning your incision. To empty your suprapubic catheter, you will need a clean cloth or paper towels to clean up spills, disposable gloves, and a wastebasket. Be sure to keep the urine collection bag lower than your hips to allow the urine to drain out of your bladder and into the bag. Step 1: wash your hands with soap and water and then dry them. Step 2: put on disposable gloves. Step 3: hold the bottom of the collection bag over a toilet. Step 4: open the drain valve. Urine will begin draining from the bag. Step 5: close the valve. Step 6: remove your disposable gloves and throw them away in the wastebasket. Step 7: wash your hands with soap and water and then dry them. Now, you will begin cleaning your catheter. You will need a plastic bag, a wastebasket, a clean washcloth, clean paper towels, cotton swabs or cotton balls, disposable gloves, a four-inch by four-inch split dressing gauze, and dressing tape. Be careful not to pull on the tubing when cleaning your catheter. Step 1: wash your hands with soap and water and then dry them. Step 2: put on disposable gloves. Step 3: gently remove any old dressing materials around your catheter incision. Put the old dressing in a plastic bag and throw it into the wastebasket. Step 4: remove your disposable gloves and throw them away in the wastebasket. Step 5: wash your hands again with soap and water and then dry them. Step 6: put on disposable gloves. Step 7: wash the skin around your incision using a washcloth and warm, soapy water. Dry your skin completely with a clean paper towel. Step 8: wash about four inches of the catheter tube where it enters your skin with a cotton swab or ball and warm, soapy water. Start at your incision and wipe away from your body. Do not wipe toward your incision. Step 9: place a new four-inch by four-inch split dressing gauze at your incision and around the catheter tube. Tape the gauze in place using dressing tape. Be sure to clean your suprapubic catheter at least once a day. Contact your surgeon if you have any questions about your suprapubic catheter; you have chills, and your temperature is 101 degrees Fahrenheit or higher; your bladder feels full, but you see no urine draining into the bag; your incision is bleeding or swollen; urine is leaking around your catheter; your urine is cloudy, has a foul odor, you see grit or stones in your urine, or you noticed bright red blood in your urine. It is normal to see a small amount of blood or pink-tinged urine after some procedures.

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