Hi. I'm Cathy with Level Up RN. In this video, I'm going to continue my coverage of pharmacology basics. Specifically, I will be talking about important antidotes for medications and I will also be covering nursing care and patient teaching when your patient is taking an antibiotic. And at the end of the video, I'm going to give you guys a little quiz to test your knowledge of some of the key points I'll be covering. So definitely stay tuned for that. And as always, I will be following along with our Level Up RN pharmacology flashcards. If you have our flashcards, definitely pull them out so you can follow along with me.
All right, so let's go over some important antidotes that you are very likely to get tested on. So the antidote for acetaminophen is N-acetylcysteine. And this is pretty easy to remember because both of those start with "a seat". The antidote for benzodiazepines such as lorazepam or alprazolam is flumazenil. And the antidote for opioid analgesics such as fentanyl or morphine is naloxone. So these two sometimes get mixed up by nursing students. So definitely remember that for benzodiazepines, it's flumazenil, and for opioid analgesics, it's naloxone. The antidote for digoxin is digoxin immune fab. That's the generic name. The brand name for that is Digibind. And then heparin and warfarin are both anticoagulants, but they have different antidotes. So the antidote for warfarin is vitamin K, and the antidote for heparin is protamine sulfate. And then lastly, the antidote for magnesium is calcium gluconate.
Moving on now to antibiotic nursing care and patient teaching. Now, we're going to be going over a lot of antibiotics in this playlist, and it's important to know the key things you need to do as a nurse and the key teaching you need to provide the patient when they are going to be taking antibiotics. So the first thing you need to do is check for patient allergies and any possible drug interactions with other medications or supplements that the patient is taking. It is also best to collect any cultures, such as blood cultures, sputum samples, or urine samples, prior to your patient beginning antibiotic therapy. In terms of patient teaching, you need to advise your patient to complete the entire course of antibiotics, even if they start feeling better partway through therapy. They should report significant side effects to their provider. And then certain antibiotics require periodic lab testing throughout therapy. So if your patient is taking an antibiotic that requires this, they need to make sure they get that lab testing as ordered by the provider. And then certain antibiotics, such as tetracyclines, can decrease the effectiveness of oral contraceptives. So your patient will need to use an alternative method of birth control through therapy. And then certain antibiotics also cause photosensitivity which places your patient at increased risk for burns, so they need to avoid sun exposure and wear sunscreen when they do go out.
All right, it's quiz time. In this quiz, I'm going to ask you the antidote for four different medications. Ready? Number one, what is the antidote for heparin? The answer is protamine sulfate. Number two, what is the antidote for benzodiazepines? The answer is flumazenil. Number three, what is the antidote for magnesium? The answer is calcium gluconate. And number four, what is the antidote for opioid analgesics? The answer is naloxone. Okay, that is it. I hope you did good with that quiz. If not, then just go back and review the flashcard or rewatch the video. Take care and good luck with studying.
