blood draw from PICC - Page 2

At my facility, the policy is to stop the heparin gtt for 5 minutes, flush (10 cc), waste (10 cc), sample (10 cc syringe, but usually only take 4-5 cc), and flush (10 cc).

Turn off all of the drips/fluids for 2 minutes before drawing. Swab w/ alcohol the port and the tops of the tubes. Then I draw back 7 ml of blood from the proximal port. Prior I add up the milliliters on the tubes, lavender and green usually 4ml each, so draw up 8 ml of blood, then flush w/ 10 cc of saline, then flush w/ 2ml of 200U/ml heparin and clamp. Then transfer syringe blood to tubes. Then I restart all the drips/fluids.

Our policy for heparin is to get a peripheral stick unless the person has crap for veins.

Otherwise, it says to do the same. Flush, waste, draw and flush all 10 cc's (less usually for the draw). Cleaning of course, gloves, etc..

Don't change caps with blood draws....dont take off for blood draws....change caps with dressing changes as your facility states (usually every 72 hours or q7 days)

Funny, our facility says you have to change the caps each time with a blood draw from a central line because going through those blue t-caps can mess up the chemistry/blah blah

Taking off your caps sig increases risk of infection...I would look at changing brand of caps

Our policy is the same with the exception of drawing cultures...we then draw directly from the line (without the cap on) in case of bacterial growth on the cap. We don't want a false positive.

Our facility is looking at that too.

Our policy is to change the caps with each blood draw, diprivan tubing change and with each new TPN bag change.. We haven't had a BSI or an increase in infection since we implemented this. Actually we haven't had a BSI in more than 2 years. That includes our PICC and TLC.