Topical Medication Administration (Nursing)

00:04 Welcome to the skill, topical medication administration.

00:07 When we talk about topical, it sounds just like that.

00:11 This is something that usually goes on top of the skin layer.

00:15 This is gonna look like something about like lotions or some medicated creams.

00:20 It'll be something along those lines. When we have the medication itself, we'll start with that but we definitely need some gloves to go along with that to apply the medication.

00:30 So, before we give our topical med, don't forget your seven rights of medication administration.

00:37 Next, we need to look at the site that we're going to apply the medicine to.

00:43 Now, this is important because if we're going to give the medication on a particular site on the skin, we need to see, is that site intact? Is the skin intact? You can imagine how absolutely painful or uncomfortable or complications that occur if you put a medicated lotion or cream on a site of the skin that is broken.

01:06 However, sometimes it is ordered to do so, so, follow your physical order.

01:11 If we need to, sometimes, we need to clean that skin thoroughly for any debris using soap or water and dry.

01:20 Now, we may need to perform hand hygiene again and replace our gloves if they're soiled and then, we can open that topical medication.

01:30 So, once we open it, we can apply that medication to our gloved hand to apply or directly to the site of the application itself and when we do so, use gentle, smooth strokes to apply the medication to the affected area.

01:46 We don't wanna rub really harshly.

01:48 We just wanna apply it very nice and smooth and cover the affected area.

01:53 Let's look at some special considerations regarding topical meds.

01:58 One of these is we do not wanna apply topical meds to skin that is broken or not intact unless it is specifically for that and it's ordered by the physician.

02:10 We do wanna definitely keep in mind that some mucus membranes will absorb these meds quicker than when applied to the skin.

02:18 Also, be cautious that there may be interactions with lotions or other creams that the patient uses and also, we definitely wanna routinely assess the application site.

02:28 Once we apply a medicated cream or a lotion, this could cause issues with the patient's skin and we wanna assess for that.