Don't Look Away When They Stick the Needle in You

[Ben]

This is interesting research. It suggests that if you watch where they stick the needle when the medical person sticks it in you, the pain is lessened. It also suggests this works for other pain. Also just looking at your body (or a virtual simulation) versus looking at some inanimate object.

I'm not scared of needles or blood, but when, for instance,  I get blood drawn, I look away just because I'm afraid I'll do a reflex thing just before the needle goes in if I see it coming. Sorta like the problems I give the eye doctor when he holds my eyes open and puts drops in. Takes him about a half a bottle of the dilation fluid to get a couple of drops in my eye. 

It doesn't really hurt when I get blood work, but next time I'm going to try and remember to stare at my arm and see if I notice any difference.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2120537-looking-at-a-virtual-hand-reduces-the-pain-in-your-real-hand/

[Kingcreek]

Yup. Been doing it since I was a little kid. Started as curious but I found out if I watched I could control any flinch and never was bothered by needles or blood. Even my own.

[41magsnub]

If I look at the needle I get nauseous.  It's weird, I can have a deep cut with heavy bleeding and I'm fine (except for the bleeding part obviously).  Stick a needle in me...

[MillCreek]

We ask patients about issues with needles or blood or any prior problems before we do the blood draw.  There are a lot of patients who faint when they see the venipuncture, and they fall right out of the draw chair onto the floor, or bump their head or other issues.

[Ben]

If I look at the needle I get nauseous.  It's weird, I can have a deep cut with heavy bleeding and I'm fine (except for the bleeding part obviously).  Stick a needle in me...

I'm almost the opposite. Needles don't bother me in that way. Possibly because as a kid I was desensitized to them. I had asthma and a lot of allergies so used to get allergy shots once a week for several years. I think I still always looked away when the needle went in though. :)

On cuts, I'm weird. I have had major gashes on arms, legs, and head. The blood from those larger injuries has never bothered me. Where I get lightheaded? When I get a cut on a finger. I have no idea why, but anything more than a papercut, and there's a 50% chance I'll get lightheaded. I've never fainted and I work through it, but it's just weird that something minor on a finger will set me off, while a gusher anywhere else is, meh.

[BobR]

I used to teach basic EMTs classes on how to start IVs and if I had a student that just couldn't grasp the angles of the needle when starting them I would start them on myself so they could watch. I would usually use my hand because the vein was more visible and they could see the relation of the needle to the vein a lot easier. Usually after watching one done very slowly with a lot of explanation they would get it.

bob

[KD5NRH]

On cuts, I'm weird. I have had major gashes on arms, legs, and head. The blood from those larger injuries has never bothered me. Where I get lightheaded? When I get a cut on a finger. I have no idea why, but anything more than a papercut, and there's a 50% chance I'll get lightheaded. I've never fainted and I work through it, but it's just weird that something minor on a finger will set me off, while a gusher anywhere else is, meh.

Used to work with a guy who could could field dress most animals with his teeth and not think twice, and had no issue whatsoever with blood from anything or anyone, but any of his own and he was out like a light.  Papercuts would get him to the point of falling down, and a needle stick would put him out.

[Fly320s]

I get light headed after having blood drawn.  All it takes is two vials and I get loopy.

[HeroHog]

I am strange (yeah, I'm sure yer shocked) in that I can get a toe nail ripped straight up and I will grab it and rip that sucker the rest of the way out right away. Hands covered in grease and filth and get cut to the bone on a finger? Go to the parts washer, scrub it out, go to the bathroom, get the Orange Pumice GoJo and finish the job, then go to the medical cabinet and put some salve on it and bandage it up and go back to work. Ya can hardly see the scar now and the whole end of that finger was just flopping in the breeze! Now, what's strange ya ask? Watching surgery or needles gives me the willies BIG TIME! On TV, I don't watch that stuff! When I get shots, minor surgery, I am NOT lookin! I don't pass out, faint or that stuff but I do get pretty creeped out. If I pushed it, who knows? Now in an emergency, it's not an issue. I can manage and do what needs to be done. I've done it before. Go figure.

[lee n. field]

This is interesting research. It suggests that if you watch where they stick the needle when the medical person sticks it in you, the pain is lessened. It also suggests this works for other pain. Also just looking at your body (or a virtual simulation) versus looking at some inanimate object.

I'm not scared of needles or blood, but when, for instance,  I get blood drawn, I look away just because I'm afraid I'll do a reflex thing just before the needle goes in if I see it coming. Sorta like the problems I give the eye doctor when he holds my eyes open and puts drops in. Takes him about a half a bottle of the dilation fluid to get a couple of drops in my eye. 

It doesn't really hurt when I get blood work, but next time I'm going to try and remember to stare at my arm and see if I notice any difference.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2120537-looking-at-a-virtual-hand-reduces-the-pain-in-your-real-hand/

I usually reassure the phlebotomist that I'm not going to freak out.  I've been stuck bunches in the last 2.5 years.

[230RN]

No problem with it.  With one of my first "sentient" shots, Mom said something to the effect of seeing if it actually hurt or was it just a sting.  Forget what shot it was, whooping cough, polio, smallpox, but I realized it stung but didn't actually hurt.  

No problem since then, but I'm squeamish about things like rotting human corpses (like on "Bones") and stuff like that.  I can't imagine how Graves Registration people do what they do after battles, and coroners.  On other icky things, it kind of depends.  Mostly on whether I can smell it or not.

But needles and drawing blood doesn't bother me at all.

[Monkeyleg]

Up until last year, I didn't look when I was being stuck. Then, when I was in the hospital, and getting stuck at least a dozen times a day, I started watching. No biggie. I was watching the techniques of the people doing the blood draws, to see who was doing what to give as little pain as possible. Once I found the king-of-no-pain, I requested that he be the one to draw all blood from me.

[Jim147]

Getting up to 50 vials drawn at a time I learned who I wanted working when I went in real quick.

If you want to watch one have it be when they put a big gauge in your wrist on the way to the er. That is fun.

jim

[AJ Dual]

Needles? I like watching myself get surgery. Watching my finger laid open and a bone tumor get ground off was pretty freaking cool. Surgeon was super reluctant letting me watch, but I convinced him. Chatting away about how he didn't have to worry about ligaments going in from the side made it easier, and made up for a bit that it was on the inside of my Left index finger, and not on the outside with more space to work made him forget about his worries quick enough.

The nurse was  the whole time at me though. At least I thought so with her eyes over the mask.

Heart catheterization was really neat too. "Oh wow! I can feel it moving up in my chest, that's cool..." But the Cardiologist got mad and yelled at the anesthesiologist that I wasn't supposed to be awake. And everything went black after that.  But it might have been important I be out because it was an electrical test, not a rotor-rootering of any kind.

Which is still weird, because while it was fine due to the lidocaine shot, the "worst" part of the whole thing, for a non-freak person at least, would be when they cut your thigh open and screw in the femoral artery port which is kind of like a big drywall anchor thingy, and you're awake for that part. 

[BlueStarLizzard]

I will continue to look away for all needle sticks. It's not so much a "pain" thing as a "weird" thing and I hate the way it feels. I hate blood draws especially, because the needle has to stay in your arm and I really want to rip the mother *expletive deleted*er out.

I also don't like blood pressure cuffs for the same reason, although I'm slightly more tolerant of it.

[41magsnub]

Needles? I like watching myself get surgery. Watching my finger laid open and a bone tumor get ground off was pretty freaking cool. Surgeon was super reluctant letting me watch, but I convinced him. Chatting away about how he didn't have to worry about ligaments going in from the side made it easier, and made up for a bit that it was on the inside of my Left index finger, and not on the outside with more space to work made him forget about his worries quick enough.

The nurse was  the whole time at me though. At least I thought so with her eyes over the mask.

Heart catheterization was really neat too. "Oh wow! I can feel it moving up in my chest, that's cool..." But the Cardiologist got mad and yelled at the anesthesiologist that I wasn't supposed to be awake. And everything went black after that.  But it might have been important I be out because it was an electrical test, not a rotor-rootering of any kind.

Which is still weird, because while it was fine due to the lidocaine shot, the "worst" part of the whole thing, for a non-freak person at least, would be when they cut your thigh open and screw in the femoral artery port which is kind of like a big drywall anchor thingy, and you're awake for that part. 

I remember literally nothing about my cardiac catheterization because they put me on versed.

[French G.]

Eh, I look away. I am Mr. Field dressing at work when someone does something Dr worthy. I have bled myself pretty good too with no issues. But I get crappy quick on a blood draw. I'd chalk it up to psychology, aka being a wimp, but I remember the first time I went out, fasting physical, lots of vials for a service academy, and out I went. Walked around the mall after that for the rest of the day, vision was black and white until after I ate and peripheral vision took several hours to return. I have low BP and orthostatic hypotension. Another big draw when idiots lost my record ten years into the military, felt bad after one vial, laid down and felt fine for the rest.

[dm1333]

I don't look when the phlebotomists at the local hospital draw blood.  They seem stymied by my tough veins and I always leave with 3 or 4 holes in me and a big bloody mark on my elbow.

[RoadKingLarry]

Getting up to 50 vials drawn at a time I learned who I wanted working when I went in real quick.

If you want to watch one have it be when they put a big gauge in your wrist on the way to the er. That is fun.

jim

Never was squeamish about watching them draw blood, even as a kid.
First time I ever had an IV done was a little odd though.
I was 16 and getting my right knee reassembled (football). They'd already doped me with something and when I was getting prepped in the OR I distinctly remember watching them put the IV needle in the back of my hand. It was as big as a railroad spike and they drove it in with a hammer.

[AJ Dual]

I remember literally nothing about my cardiac catheterization because they put me on versed.

I've got that redhead melanin/gene thing where opioids, benzos , and various kinds of anesthesia don't work as well, or need higher doses to work. Sucks at the dentist sometimes after 3-4 shots I can still feel the drill. Or I have to convince them to use the root-canal strength shot that leaves you numb for 8 hours.

Reminds me of my appendectomy back when I was 19, where they did the countdown, and I was like, "Was I supposed to be out now?" And the anesthesiologist said something like, "You'll be out once this white stuff (Ketamine?) in your I.V. reaches your arm tough guy..." And he was right.

Then in recovery the nurses were all baby-talking me, "YOU'RE IN RECOVERY, YOU'RE WAKING UP NOW." and I'm sitting there going, "Yeah, I know. I feel fine." And they seemed perturbed I was so awake and normal. And pre-Internet, pre-YouTube I didn't know that I could have gotten away with saying all sorts of crazy stuff, or hit on the nurses in an explicit manner to entertain myself.

[230RN]

"Now count backwards slowly from 100..."

"Okay... ummm... 64... 63... 62... 61... 60... 5F... 5E... 5D..."

"Oh,  you darned computer nerds...."

[Scout26]

Heart catheterization was really neat too. "Oh wow! I can feel it moving up in my chest, that's cool..." But the Cardiologist got mad and yelled at the anesthesiologist that I wasn't supposed to be awake. And everything went black after that.  But it might have been important I be out because it was an electrical test, not a rotor-rootering of any kind.

As an FYI, there is no singing, especially Das Panzerlied allowed in the Cath Lab...

[KD5NRH]

"Now count backwards slowly from 100..."

"Okay... ummm... 64... 63... 62... 61... 60... 5F... 5E... 5D..."

"Oh,  you darned computer nerds...."

100
011
010
001
000

Now what?

[sumpnz]

Yeah, no, not going to look.  I haven't yet passed out from a blood draw, and I'd like to keep it that way.

[K Frame]

Should I look away if I'm jamming a needle in someone else?