PICC Lines in Radiology

SWAT_RN · Nov 26, 2004

Does anyone have rad techs placing PICCs at their facility? We have a new employee who did this routinely at a previous employer, but we aren't sure how kosher it is. Thanks in advance.

nurhmb · Nov 26, 2004

Does anyone have rad techs placing PICCs at their facility? We have a new employee who did this routinely at a previous employer, but we aren't sure how kosher it is. Thanks in advance.

You can check your state practice acts. Ours in PA say no.

Here is my very biased opinion on this topic as a nurse in full time action for 27 years. This is an RN skill level procedure that involves assessment, intervention and patient education. Many things can go wrong and you need the advanced skills of an RN. Also, just because someone has a skill does not mean that the patient welfare is being met. Finally, why are you giving up RN skilled pieces that involve assessment, intervention, patient education, trouble-shooting and possible emergency care? Why are you saying that anyone can perform this task? When you give this up you are saying that RN's are not needed or necessary for complex medical care.....bad idea. You are disapaiting our respect and down playing the need for nurses to keep patients alive and well in our healthcare system today. (See the NIH research on this) Do you feel that anyone can perform this skill? Then you have not experienced the issues that can occur. Trust me. Your first crisis will support this opinion. Things can and do go wrong no matter how skilled you are in the process. Please think twice about even considering this option. HMB RN, MSN, CNS, Certified Nurse in IV therapy, long term PICC inserter and educator

Spirit-A-Glow · Feb 4, 2005

i am a staff memeber of the radiology dept - i do use ultrasound for location ot the vessel and i use fluoro to guide the length of the catheter and to be certain of its location before i cut the catheter.

i operate both pieces of equipmen. i use the foot pedal to activate the fluoro as i need to, but the technician who turns on and off the source, is presnet while i work in case i need anything. the tech then takes the final photo from the control board after i place the catheter for documenation.

the ultrasound i turn on an off myself (using sterile technique, sometimes i need them to turn it off while i finish the case), but we have a small unit just for this purpose.

our credentialing is that the physician in charge of the radiology dept needs to observe our technique and check us off on our performance list that we made up for this purpose. able to demonstrate steile technieque, proper operation of equipment, and of course proper knowledge of picc line placement. it is a check off competency that we do yearly. i do enjoy doing these, at times a resident is present and they can do them also, so we often switch off to keep up our experience.

:wink2:

are any radiology rn's placing picc lines in their departments and if so are you utilizing fluoro or ultrasound guidance?

in the instance that you are using fluoro, is it a technologist administering the radiation?

what type of credentialling or certification is required at your facility/state?
thanks!

Karenwithkids · Mar 8, 2005

i am a staff memeber of the radiology dept - i do use ultrasound for location ot the vessel and i use fluoro to guide the length of the catheter and to be certain of its location before i cut the catheter.
i operate both pieces of equipmen. i use the foot pedal to activate the fluoro as i need to, but the technician who turns on and off the source, is presnet while i work in case i need anything. the tech then takes the final photo from the control board after i place the catheter for documenation.
the ultrasound i turn on an off myself (using sterile technique, sometimes i need them to turn it off while i finish the case), but we have a small unit just for this purpose.
our credentialing is that the physician in charge of the radiology dept needs to observe our technique and check us off on our performance list that we made up for this purpose. able to demonstrate steile technieque, proper operation of equipment, and of course proper knowledge of picc line placement. it is a check off competency that we do yearly. i do enjoy doing these, at times a resident is present and they can do them also, so we often switch off to keep up our experience.
:wink2:

i would be very interested in reviewing your credentialing check-list. i have been regularly placing picc lines for a few years now. i have previously worked in interventional rad, icu, nicu, finished my msn. our hospital has several picc nurses that all work full time in other jobs (no designated time or rn to do the job). we squeeze it into our other job time. our interventional rad docs don't want to do the job, and will only look at the patients after we have done a full assessment and tried placement. i have an information request out to our state board (co) and am trying to gather information/data to support nurse credentialing for picc placement by an rn under flouroscopy and the hiring of a full time picc nurse. thank you in advance for any help you can give me. :melody:

Eduardo · Mar 8, 2005

Dawn;

Will you please share with me a little more about the "microintroducer" and your success utilizing it. Thanks

Well this is a very HOT topic where I am from. I have been a Pediatric RN for 6 years and have fought tooth and nail to have RNs certified to insert PICC lines in our pediatric population without having to go to Fluro.
We have in years past had a couple PICC RN inserting line with poor success rates and the patients ended up in Fluroscopy. Our Fluro dept has a rule that any Peds patient requiring a PICC line must have previously unsuccessful attempts by the PICC RN, and then they will accept the pt AND ONLY the Radiologist will insert the PICC with Tech assistance. They do use a "ritesight" (ultrasound) sometimes but most of the times they only use contrast and xrays for Tip verification.
But now back to the RN placing PICCs. over the past 3 years I have been placing PICC without the use of ultrasound and now use a MICROINTRODUCER! Which has changed the world of PICC insertion in the pediatric population. We have 10 PICC RNs for Pediatrics (not including NICU PICC RNs) We have a 98% success rate for insertion and have decreased the number of attempts because the ease of the Microintroducer.
I can give you more information if you would like it. Hope this helps!!
-Dawn

ECMOismygame · Sep 2, 2005

some hospitals have a team of nurses that do beside PICCs but only into subclavian. mine doesnt. here PICCs are done in radiology "special procedures" the Rn circulates and documents while the RT assists. most RadMD's hate doing them especially on weekends. the tech uses us to find vein and mark it and then radMD will do the procedure. in our dept the only RN is the one working in specials. nuc med and ct techs all start their own IV's (except the lazy ones).

JMGONZAL · Oct 20, 2005

I do have a question, does anyone have specific criteria for maintaining competency? How many a year do you have to do to stay competent? Does it include the use of the ultrasound machine use? Or, is it once you are certified PICC RN is OK from then on? Does that PICC certificate expire? I am new to this and still researching the issue. I am an angio RN and now the department is looking into letting us do the PICC lines in Radiology.

7272laurie · Oct 23, 2005

Hello, I'm part of a 3 member team...We are the Rad nurses and the PICC team at our hospital. Two of us have ER/CCU experience and one OR experience and have been nursing for >30 yr each. We feel we have very good IV skills, nursing skills, common sense and we know the staff and docs very well. The reason I'm mentioning all this is because this is what sold two of us to administration. ~6 yrs ago we found ourselves running from CCU to Radiology to sedate someone who was anxious /painful and having a procedure done. Then we asked ourselves, "how can we sell ourselves into having a job in Radiology". We were constantly finding ways to show them what an asset we are to the department. To make a long story short, they hired the two of us...We started right away writing standards and policies; helping with safety issues and making it known that having us there will make life easier in every way. We started off part time, one person on a day, then it got busy enough to have one full time and the other part time (we overlapped our schedule to cover the busy times). Then we got stats together on how the hospital could save money and increase patient satisfaction if they sent us to PICC class instead of having outside nurses come in to do the few piccs that were ordered. We sold ourselves again. That was 2 years ago. We went from a couple of PICCs/mth to ~10-30/mth by marketing our team to both the physicians and the nurses...teaching everything (but insertion) including how to be proactive for your patient. We've since (one yr ago) hired our 3rd team member who was sent to PICC class 6 mths ago. We are getting ready to do more teaching (for the docs, nurses, home health care and nursing homes)...the more they know, the easier it will be for them to order/take care of PICCs. We have a 'sort of' office down in Radiology (desk, phone, computer, files, in box, etc...), we have revised most of the Radiology P&P, written all of the PICC P&P, written/revised the central line P&P and written/revised the moderate sedation policy, we have a small Radiology dpt...we do about 2-3 liver/lung biopsies/week; start all the hard CT IVs, cath the VCUGs, assist with neph tube placement, abscess drainage, do all of the Portacath lab draws in lab, manage all of the things needed pre and post procedure (including calling the pt pre and post) and start all the other non CT IVs...we are anxious to start back with more interventional procedures but our Radiologists are going through a mid life crisis so anything really fun is on hold for a while. We cover from 0800 to 1730 M-F and now that there's 3 of us we each cover every third w/e for picc inserting or troubleshooting. We have a 'site-rite' US that we use when we put in our PICCs. We insert them all at the bedside. We are hoping that more marketing with the physicians coming up they'll be an increase in out pt placement which we do in the SSU. We hardly ever need fluoro but when we do the Radiologists are more than happy to help out (this is when we reach a dead end with the catheter and can't move it forward). We've also started injecting contrast/pcxr prior to taking them to fluoro just to get an even better idea of what venous mapping we're dealing with. We had an excellent teacher and were able to use their hospital's 10 member PICC team's P&Ps, competancies, troubleshooting/educational material, etc. as templates for our smaller hospital. We have annual requirements, signing each other off, we have many quality checks that are given to our quality assurance dpt, we have very good safety checks that gave us a thumbs up with being credentialed, we went to class to learn how to read our tip placements (the radiologists still have the final say). Our goals are to have all 3 of us certified in infusion and radiology nursing.We have a zero infection rate with our piccs...we have a standard prior to the picc being removed if they suspect cath related infection. We are proud of what we've accomplished because we, personally, took a lot of time to make it work and there is so much yet to learn!

TGreen · Jan 20, 2006

Are any radiology RN's placing Picc lines in their departments and if so are you utilizing fluoro or ultrasound guidance?
In the instance that you are using fluoro, is it a technologist administering the radiation?
What type of credentialling or certification is required at your facility/state?
Thanks!

I am a DI nurse in Florida. There are five nurses in our Radiology Dept. all of whom insert Picc lines. We use the Modified Seldinger technique. Our PICC lines are placed without a Radiologist present. The placement is confirmed by a Radiologist prior to Picc line use. We use ultrasound guidance always to place the pick and prefer fluoro to confirm placement and to correct any problems such as the picc line looping, or going to the wrong place and can be easily corrected. If the patient is in ICU we will place the Picc line at the bedside using ultrasound but a portable CXR is used to confirm placement. This is much more difficult because you do not have the real time view of flouro and if there is a problem with placement multiple CXR may be needed and any problems are corrected blindly. The Picc is usually completed but occasionally the pt may need to be taken to DI for fluoro. This also takes longer because the film has to be taken to DI for developing and then shown to the radiologist for approval. We are assisted by a specials tech 90% of the time because they are the ones who know how to work the fluoro. If done at the bedside we are assisted by a XRay tech or another DI nurse and a PCXR is called for. Our Hospital sends the DI nurses to a PICC class that is required but you recieve a certificate stating that you completed the class but not an actual certification such as a CCRN would get. I hope that this information is helpful to you.

winkywolf · Jun 16, 2006

We are just starting to have nurses do Picc lines at out hospital. We use ultrasound and Bard Kits Where did you get education otherthan what Bard provided?

bridrobi · Jun 20, 2006

We have the technologists fluoro for confirmation,prior to cxr

drewba · Sep 11, 2006

I am currently employed in a community hospital that has experienced exponential growth during the past 5 years. As a result our existing site rite assisted picc team can be overwhelmed and although our success for bedside placement is greater than 98% some patients require additional fluoro for placement. I would like to know what if any practice regulations there are fro nursing inseeting PICC's under fluoro? Can we do this? is there any existing arrangements whereby a radiologist must be inthe room at time of fluoro. I am sure there is implications for billing as well. I would greatly appreciate anyones time and input regarding this query as we try to amalgamate skills in this area to provide optimal patient outcome cost effectively. Look forward to hearing. I curently practice in NY state.

Drewba