Harm Reduction Injecting/rupturing/nicking arteries

[Riotgirl]

Hi,

I'm not certain if this new thread is allowed. I know there is an IV complications thread, but with the quick scanning ive done - ive found very little about injecting into arteries and complications from fucking with your arteries. Like immediate, middle term & long term. Actually, there is plenty about long term problems; gangrene, loss of limb, necrosis, Etc Etc.

How can you tell if you fucked up an artery?
(Specifically groin - been hitting both sides).

And:
Shoot up in your artery - small amount to oh shit I emptied my whole shot in. (& do it more than once?) Weirdly, I got the artery in the crook of my arm weeks ago. i had no idea - just felt like a crazy shock & pulled out quick! I'm not having any of that with these femoral arteries or abdomen. Once my pussy lit on fire & toes tingled, unfortunately I had already put 1/2 in.

Nick your artery
Rupture it
Any damage to it

Signs, symptoms, complications? I know it oftrn burns & theres TONS of pain If you hit it. But what about ify ou rupture it? How long do you have till you hit the floor? If you nick it what's the time frame, what happens then. My toes aren't blue and this mishap was at least an hour ago, so I believe I'm safe. I do have an older gentleman who was a volunteer EMT/firefighter with me. He's checked me out and thinks I'm fine. I personally think my thigh is overall swollen (no red) & my leg is discoloured.

Then i went for my hip/abdomen area.... and think I did it again. Registered, very dark dark- slow moving blood. So dark almost black! Then my damn hip started getting swollen UNDER the skin.

I've had no spurting, geysers or registering with my plunger being pushed back. it's all under skin I believe. cant twll if my vision is fuzzy from being fucked up...

Oh and bad news, don't give me shit - i know its bad. My rigs are old. I don't have access to anymore. No needle exchange here. Very old & 28 or 27 guage. Tomorrow I'm going to try & get new ones & not go again till I have them.

Thank you!!! Any information on arteries & etc is much appreciated. Just being pointed in the right direction to find it!

Hmmm I'm feeling tired.. symptom?

Or paranoia. I have been shooting up C & H, oddly the C has bath salts in it I believe.

Anyone ever heard of that either?!

I'd also go else where but my viens ran away. I've been an on/off user since I was 15 (36 now). Seems to have really gotten worse and in the past 6 months... really since I started getting this one C. Found out there is bath salts in it.. never had confirmation.. but seems right.

Anywho. Thanks for any tips, info, and harm reduction

 

[dirzted]

There's def more people on bluelight who'll know more about arterial injections than me but as for now I'm very comforted by the fact you had an EMT examine you and give you the all clear. If he said it was okay than I'd venture to guess you'll be alright for now but of course the best route is to seek immediate medical attention if anything else pops up.

One thing I do know however is that arterial blood is actually LIGHTER and FROTHIER (full of air bubbles) than blood from your veins, so that's a good sign that perhaps you weren't even hitting an artery to begin with.

You DEFINITELY need to get new sharps, shooting with old dull needles can lead to many different complications and could be behind alot of the trouble your are reporting.

Please be safe and try and take care of yourself

 

[Znegative]

Hey if you're shooting into your femoral vein I can't stress how important it is as well to use new sharps. I didn't always have that luxury, but it can make a huge difference in terms of hitting the artery instead, or causing a DVT.

I've nicked the femoral artery, shot into the femoral artery, and missed in my groine quite a few times as my femoral was the main veins that I used for the last 1 1/2 years of my IV drug use. I suppose I was always really lucky, because there were plenty of times where I'd miss entire shots of tar, sometimes mixed with crystal into my artery, and the worst that happened would be that my dick would feel like it was on fire, my leg would swell up, and I'd limp around for a few days. There was a period of time when the needle exchange hadn't been showing up for several weeks in a row, so we were all down to reusing our dirties, and over a very short time I started to build up massive amounts of scar tissue in the vein and around it, to the point where it looked like I had little horns on either side of my groin. This made it very hard to hit the vein, and would often lead to me nicking the artery, and after doing that a handful of times, I started to bleed ALOT. I mean, shit, you should have seen my boxers, COVERED in blood, my legs, down to my ankles had blood running down them, it was fucked up. I finally got some cleans and switched to my brachial for a while to let my femoral recover, because I could see where that was heading.

I had a friend that didn't let up, and just kept pushing the rig down further into that scar tissue until he applied so much pressure that it burst through, making a belly button sized hole. He would have the plastic barrel 10-20cc's inside his body before he could get a register. Last I heard from him he had gotten a DVT, was hospitalized and then kicked out for shooting dope into the IV's...

Really if you're not really confident with your ability/capability to hit the fem, then I wouldn't fuck with it. Try using your brachial instead. That's still a dangerous one, but at least you can see it. The femoral vein IMO is the easiest vein to hit, especially if your thin, but you really have to be taught in person how to do it. You can't learn it from reading a blue light tutorial, or from just watching some online video. Once you got it though, treat that thing like gold, because you do not want to blow it. Always, Always use cleans, and regardless of length, it's ideal to use 27g (longs or regular size). Rigs with smaller gauges have a higher probability of snapping off in your groin, this happened to me once, but I was able to remove it.

 

[sm0kestack]

I shot about an 1/8 of a sub strip into my radial artery once, confusing it with a new found vein. As you can imagine, boy did I find out it wasn't a vein. It felt like my hand was on fire, white spots all over, and an excruciating pain where the artery disappears into the joint of your thumb. Man, did that hurt. After a night of reading on BlueLight what happens if your shoot into an artery, all fingers reported immediately going to the ER. Instead of immediately going ,I went the next morning. They tested for infection, and evidence of blood clotting, but found none. So they released me. They told me come back immediately if it started changing colors and increasing pain or if my extremities started turning blue. It was scary, but I guess I was lucky, as pills and strips like subs have fillers and binders in them that are not completely water soluble, and can clog up smaller blood vessels like capillaries. Very dangerous.

Anyway, all that happened was the area from the joint of my thumb all thru the arch of my index finger was very stiff and sore for a few days. That was back in December, it's May now, so I think I am in clear as for long term complications out of that. But it sucked.

Now when I go to IV, especially in New injection sites, I feel the vein in question for a pulse, as arteries have pulses from pumping from the heart. And like Zneg said, the blood color is a lot brighter and foamy. I read up on more proper IVing technique, and it has helped a lot.

I hope you're OK OP. I have the whole story of my arterial incident posted in the IV COMPLICATIONS.... It could happen to YOU thread somewhere.

 

[Riotgirl]

Jesus, I think i keep hitting arteries - crook of arm?

Please need info

 

[Riotgirl]

Just saw responses!

 

[Riotgirl]

Thank you for all the replies. I feel a lot better knowing it is recoverable from, but am still deciding on whether to go to the hospital. My legs seem swollen & darker. My toes arent blue - im keeping an eye on them. They do seem whiter? I have a missed shot/blister that swelled up on the top of my foot previously. I went to the hospital for that. Taking Keflex & Bactrin. I just don't want to bleed profusely into my leg & lose it or me! I had taught my self fem shots via bluelight and a harm reduction site. I started off great, did a great job - no problems.... & then in the past 2 days... ive screwed it all up. Pqossibly, I've simply read more of the dangers and im just freaking myself out!

Thank you, it's really helpful knowing you recovered from a nicked artery/artery shot. Didn't lose any limbs? Im pretty sure im done with these fem hits. Too damn scary!

I've gotten new rigs - 31 guage & a short tip. Not what I wanted, but all I was told they have. Beggars cant be choosers! Unsure where to go with these. Hand viens & foot viens.... well, not really.

Also... I seem to be unable or it's REALLY hard to register, like I've spent hours trying to do one shot. I've tried every where! Could this be a lack of blood flow... nicking an artery? all i can seem to pull when i finally do is deep dark red. And that never registers right.. so its a partial miss. Ugh.

Edited - because my phone's auto correct has a mind of it's own.

 

[Riotgirl]

What if therss a bunch of cogulated blood in rhe syringe, but doesnt clog it up?

 

[Riotgirl]

I just hit my thigh & mybleg is hurting, like contracting?

 

[Swimmingdancer]

Could you be having a reaction to something in your drugs? Who knows what is in them. It seems unlikely that you are hitting an artery every single time you inject, even when using a bunch of different locations.

Of course the wise/healthy answer about shooting a syringe full of coagulated blood is don't do it but I'm sure you already did it anyway, I regularly did that when I was addicted, addiction is not rational.

 

[Znegative]

Thank you for all the replies. I feel a lot better knowing it is recoverable from, but am still deciding on whether to go to the hospital. My legs seem swollen & darker. My toes arent blue - im keeping an eye on them. They do seem whiter? I have a missed shot/blister that swelled up on the top of my foot previously. I went to the hospital for that. Taking Keflex & Bactrin. I just don't want to bleed profusely into my leg & lose it or me! I had taught my self fem shots via bluelight and a harm reduction site. I started off great, did a great job - no problems.... & then in the past 2 days... ive screwed it all up. Pqossibly, I've simply read more of the dangers and im just freaking myself out!

Thank you, it's really helpful knowing you recovered from a nicked artery/artery shot. Didn't lose any limbs? Im pretty sure im done with these fem hits. Too damn scary!

I've gotten new rigs - 31 guage & a short tip. Not what I wanted, but all I was told they have. Beggars cant be choosers! Unsure where to go with these. Hand viens & foot viens.... well, not really.

Also... I seem to be unable or it's REALLY hard to register, like I've spent hours trying to do one shot. I've tried every where! Could this be a lack of blood flow... nicking an artery? all i can seem to pull when i finally do is deep dark red. And that never registers right.. so its a partial miss. Ugh.

Edited - because my phone's auto correct has a mind of it's own.

Dont misinterpret what I'm saying though, just because I was lucky, doesn't mean you necessarily will, you should check out the case studies thread. You can die, or loose limbs from arterial injections, especially if your shooting up pills, though I can't imagine black tar heroin is at all any better. Another real danger from missing in the groin is that the possibility of getting an abscess down there is exponentially higher as it's not exactly the cleanest area for injection. Always use an alcohol pad to clean the area off first. Getting an abscess by your femoral artery could kill you.

Other ideas for injection spots:

-The backs of your knees (31g are good for those)
-The back of your ankles
-Tying off your foot at the ankle, there's tons of veins that are surprisingly strong in your feet, and I even had some good ones on the top of my large toe.
-Your brachial-You have to tie off at the armpit, and that ones dangerous too but it's a lot easier for most people to hit then the femoral, you can see it which helps
-Your shoulders going into your chest (not your tits-my ex used to do that and it would make me so depressed :/)
-The back of your elbows
-If you're thin there are too superficial veins that are pretty strong that branch out from your groin area up towards your stomach in a V formation
-The inside of your knee there's a really large vein that goes up your calf and your thigh for a while
-the inside of your ankles

Obviously if you have any veins on your arms or hands, use those before trying any of the options I listed. I don't want to question your technique but there's always room for improvement! Even if the veins on your hands or arms might be difficult to hit, try to figure it out. All the options I've listed are less then ideal, but I know how it is to sit around in your underpants covered in blood and crying because its been three hours and your shots clogged...And I also know that it takes a lot for an IV user to settle for muscling, though I eventually did for a while before I learned to hit my femoral. If you get micron filters, you might consider switching to IM for a while, give your veins a break, but really only if you have clean equipment and micron filters. Otherwise you're guaranteed and abscess eventually through IM injections.

 

[svacheme3]

Speaking of complications, I've been getting some aweful complications lately... get a strong register but close to the surface, no downstream burning like a main artery hit, but the skin surface burns a little and flashes white. So I check again. Still strong register and no resistance and no lump forming. But it's going somewhere it shouldn't, and the following days the spot turns into a bruise and necrotizes. So now I've got patches of dead skin. No abscess forms, just a patch of skin dies and turns black and dry.
The moral of the story is every HR shit I've ever read doesn't describe such a bad hit. It's not an artery hit or a miss, and the scars will never heal. Best guess is an arteriole but how I could get reliable and repeatable registers from something so small and why it's so close to the surface (maybe 1mm? barely past the hole in the needle tip) contradicts what I know about normal vascular anatomy.. nurses at the needle exchanges are similarly confused.

 

[Riotgirl]

Holy shit on the dead skin! Thanks for the ideas on other areas to hit. I have gone back to trying for them. But I've never been able to get the back of my knees. I do it ankles, feet, & chest a lot. I've been going after the small burns in my stomach area, below my chest. I think the V formation vien I've got a few times. I am pretty thin & my viens all together suck. They almost always blow. Haven't ever seen my brachial. I've started hitting knees and thighs previously... but those are harder to hit now for some reason. Think I'm done with the femoral.

My legs are back to normal, but I've had circulation to my feet. Tied off last night and within minutes they were blue & cold. Ho shit! Jumped up & got the blood flowing. Yeah... I've been thro about 300$ in missed fucking hits this past week. Clogged.. fuck. One night 5 hours spent trying to hit. Holy jesus. But I've been an off an on user for over 20 years.. so.. no wonder

 

[Riotgirl]

I didn't hit with the cogulated blood... I I'm that sucker. Better than being sick!