Skill Checklists for Taylor's Clinical Nursing Skills: A Nursing Process Approach

27

Skill Checklists for Taylor's Clinical Nursing Skills:
A Nursing Process Approach, 3rd edition

Name Date

Unit Position

Instructor/Evaluator: Position

SKILL 2-7

Assessing the Abdomen

Goal: The assessments are completed without causing the patient

to experience anxiety or discomfort, the findings are documented,

and the appropriate referral is made to other healthcare

professionals, as needed, for further evaluation. Comments

1. Perform hand hygiene and put on PPE, if indicated.


2. Identify the patient.


3. Close curtains around bed and close the door to the
   room, if possible. Explain the purpose of the abdominal
   examination and what you are going to do. Answer any
   questions.


4. Help the patient undress, if needed, and provide a patient
   gown. Assist the patient to a supine position and expose
   the abdomen. Use the bath blanket to cover any exposed
   area other than the one being assessed.


5. Inspect the abdomen for skin color, contour, pulsations,
   the umbilicus, and other surface characteristics (rashes,
   lesions, masses, scars).


6. Auscultate all four quadrants of the abdomen for bowel
   sounds by using the diaphragm of the stethoscope. Use a
   systematic method.


7. Auscultate the abdomen for vascular sounds by using the
   bell of the stethoscope.


8. Percuss the abdomen for tones.


9. Palpate the abdomen lightly in all four quadrants and then
   palpate using deep palpation technique. If the patient
   complains of pain or discomfort in a particular area of
   the abdomen, palpate that area last.


10. Palpate for the kidneys on each side of the abdomen.
    Palpate the liver at the right costal border. Palpate for
    the spleen at the left costal border.
    11.Assess for rebound tenderness last if the patient reports
    pain by pressing deeply and gently into the abdomen with
    the hand and fingers downward and then withdrawing
    the hand rapidly.


11. Palpate and then auscultate the femoral pulses in the groin.

Copyright © 2011 by Wolters Kluwer Health | Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. Skill Checklists for Taylor's Clinical Nursing Skills:

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