Okay. Emetic agents. So mechanism of action. Action is locally on the gastric mucosa. Action is centrally on the chemoreceptor trigger.
So therapeutic effects. Why do we give emetic agents? Well, it's to induce vomiting, to have the patient vomit.
Why would we do that? possibly if the patient had a poisoning, but we have to vary, like the precautions listed here must ensure cause of poisoning. That's important, right?
We have to think about, well, what is it the patient was, what were they poisoned by, right? Because if they swallowed something chemical, like chemically speaking, something very caustic going down, it's going to cause just as much damage coming out, if not worse, as it did going down. So we don't want to make sure we're inducing vomiting for a patient that swallowed something very, very caustic. And I will tell you, we don't as much give emetic agents like we used to.
And when we get to that drug class or that prototype, I'll explain that more. So contraindications. Contraindications would be if your patient was lethargic or comatose or they have an absence of gag reflex. So let me better explain this. If your patient...
Again, if they're lethargic or comatose, right? If their absence of a gag reflex, meaning if I were to stick a tongue depressor in the back of their tongue, they don't, it doesn't make them gag, right? I can elicit that gag reflex.
That means they cannot maintain their own airway, right? They're not gonna be doing a very great job of maintaining that airway. So I don't want to induce vomiting for someone who cannot protect their own airway.
What's gonna happen when they vomit? They probably more than likely are gonna aspirate. all of those gastric contents into their lungs, and we're going to have a bigger problem than what we started with. Okay. So side effects could be CNS depression, maybe dysrhythmias or diarrhea.
Nursing actions, we want to ensure the appropriateness of the treatment. Why are we giving the medication? Okay.
The biggest thing is airway protection. Drug example. So I'm going to tell you right now, this particular section, I'm not really going to test you on because this is kind of old school medication.
It's not on the shelves anymore. We don't give it. Okay.
The drug example here. is a peckic syrup. So if you remember, especially if you're, you know, maybe a mom, we used to be told to keep that syrup under the sink, right?
In case our kids got into something that we can give it to them to make them vomit and keep them from basically digesting and metabolizing whatever it is they swallowed, right? But what we've learned is it's very ineffective in poisoning. It was used for years.
However, there's no evidence supporting that inducing vomiting would actually prevent. the effects of a poisoning. So we want to make sure again that we do not induce vomiting with chemical poisoning.
Okay that's probably one of the bigger take backs from this particular section.