#444: What is a Bubble Study?

Straight A Nursing: Study for nursing school exams & NCLEX

Straight A Nursing

Education, Medicine, Health & Fitness

4.8 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 23 October 2025

⏱️ 23 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Have you ever heard of injecting bubbles into someone’s vein on purpose? Sounds wild, right? But that’s exactly what a bubble study (AKA an “agitated saline study”) does. And it’s actually a safe and effective way to detect abnormal blood flow in the heart and lungs. In this episode, you’ll learn: What a bubble study is and how it works The key clinical indications How to interpret the timing of bubble appearance on ultrasound How to assist with this procedure Tips for conducting a safe study 🎧 Tune in and get the inside scoop on the test that brings invisible shunts to light! ___________________ Full Transcript - Read the article and view references FREE CLASS - If all you've heard are nursing school horror stories, then you need this class! Join me in this on-demand session where I dispel all those nursing school myths and show you that YES...you can thrive in nursing school without it taking over your life! Study Sesh - Change the way you study with this private podcast that includes dynamic audio formats including podquizzes, case studies and drills that help you review and test your recall of important nursing concepts on-the-go. Free yourself from your desk with Study Sesh! Med Surg Solution - Are you looking for a more effective way to learn Med Surg? Enroll in Med Surg Solution and get lessons on 57 key topics and out-of-this-world study guides. Fast Pharmacology - Learn pharmacology concepts in 5 minutes or less in this audio based program. Perfect for on-the-go review! Electrolytes Study Guide - This informative bundle of one-page fact sheets has the key details you need to understand the important roles that electrolytes play. Being able to apply your interpretation of lab values is key to your nursing school success! 💕Did you love this episode? Please take a moment to follow or subscribe to the show so you never miss an episode! ___________________ The information, including but not limited to, audio, video, text, and graphics contained on this podcast are for educational purposes only. No content on this podcast is intended to guide nursing practice and does not supersede any individual healthcare provider's scope of practice or any nursing school curriculum. Additionally, no content on this podcast is intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Straight A Nursing is a proud member of the Airwave Media Network. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:42.4	I'm Nurse Mo, and this is the Straight A Nursing podcast where I teach concepts and share tips on how to thrive in school and at the bedside.
0:51.1	So today we are talking about something that I remember distinctly the very first
0:57.2	time I did it in the medical ICU because I'll be honest, kind of freaked me out a little bit.
1:04.0	And that is a bubble study. So we're going to be talking about what is a bubble study,
1:09.6	how does it work, how do you conduct a bubble
1:11.7	study, or help conduct a bubble study, I should say, and a couple tips for doing it safely.
1:20.3	So if the thought of purposefully injecting bubbles into a patient's veins makes you really nervous. Stick around, listen to this episode.
1:30.3	We're going to be diving into that now. So what is a bubble study? A bubble study, which you may also
1:37.5	here referred to by its more formal name, which is an agitated saline study, is a technique that is utilized to detect abnormal
1:48.1	intracardiac or intrapulmonary shunts. And basically, it is exactly what it sounds like. It
1:55.4	involves agitating saline with air to create micro bubbles, tiny, tiny little bubbles that can be visualized
2:03.0	during an echo cardiogram. So basically, the agitated saline, that air that is incorporated into
2:12.8	that saline and making those bubbles essentially acts as a contrast agent.
2:18.6	So it shows up really well on the monitor.
2:23.0	So now you might be wondering, well, what are the indications for a bubble study?
2:27.5	What type of patient is this conducted on?
2:30.0	So a bubble study is going to be indicated when a patient has a suspected cardiac or pulmonary abnormality that causes a right to left shunt.
	...

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