Help! What do you flush your basic, non-tunneled double or triple lumen central lines with? Our policy says heparin, most of our nurses are using saline, and much of the literature I've found supports saline. I'm trying to get a policy in place to support what our nurses are doing.
As an add-on, do you have any clotting problems with your central lines (particularly if you use saline)? Thanks! Nursemouse.
In onco/hemato ped, we flush with 10cc NS and then if you need to heplock, we do so with 4 cc (depends on the weight) of Hep. 100IU/ml...But if something is running on mine line, I just flush with NS.
Where I work, we use heparin to flush a central line. Some nurses use saline first, then heparin, some skip the saline. I've been told to use heaprin to avoid the possibility of a clot. We have prefilled 3cc syringes for both.
10cc NS followed up by 5cc Heparin 100u/ml. Someone's PICC was good and blocked up the other day, IV RN got an order to put a tPA flush through it...cleared up that clot nicely.
I had a patient who has a central line and he's allergic to heparin so we only flush with 10 cc NS and it did fine, never had a clot problem. Anyway what we usually do is we flush with 10 cc NS first then 3 cc of heparin.
thank you so much for your assistance and answers. Literature notwithstanding, it looks like it's overwhelmingly Heparin on this board. I'll admit I didn't expect that, but that's why I asked the question! As usual, you guys have been great. Take care! Nursemouse (Jeannie):blushkiss
We use saline to flush peripheral and central lines. No heparin. One of the benefits are some patients are allergic to heparin and can have nasty allergic responses. Sue:cool:
nursemouse
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Help! What do you flush your basic, non-tunneled double or triple lumen central lines with? Our policy says heparin, most of our nurses are using saline, and much of the literature I've found supports saline. I'm trying to get a policy in place to support what our nurses are doing.
As an add-on, do you have any clotting problems with your central lines (particularly if you use saline)? Thanks! Nursemouse.