port accessing tips.

[busybee04]

Hi,

I am fairly new to the oncology field, and have minimal experience accessing ports. I have successfully accessed ports in the past, however, I did miss the last two ports I attempted to access (not sure if I hit the edge). I do take my time feeling for the port. Maybe my more experienced nurses have some tips they would like to share so I more efficient in accessing ports.

[Quota, BSN, RN]

18 hours ago, Wasnt said:

I did a PICC care today and just remembered while on my bed that I didn’t flush with heparin. I flush with 10cc each lumen(3). The pt will be back next week for infusion. Any harm done? Thanks. 

I work inpatient but we never heparin flush PICC lines, only ports when we are going to de access them.  Even pts who go home with a PICC just do daily saline flushes themselves, and home health to do dressing changes. 

[Wasnt, BSN]

Thanks!

[DavidFR, BSN, MSN, RN]

On 12/3/2022 at 12:46 AM, Quota said:

I work inpatient but we never heparin flush PICC lines, only ports when we are going to de access them.  Even pts who go home with a PICC just do daily saline flushes themselves, and home health to do dressing changes. 

That's interesting as we don't even heparinise ports anymore. Practice changed many years ago here (and where I was before in the UK) to saline flushes and we don't have any extra port problems since abandoning heparin (ditto with other central access and peripheral lines. Back in the 80s everything was hep-flushed but no longer).

The only lines we heparinise on de-accessing are arterial port-a-caths after administering intra-arterial oxaliplatin. I realise that's only done in specialist centres - we are one of the few centres in France that uses intra-arterial oxaliplatin. Would be interested to know how common it is in the US?

[Wasnt, BSN]

Thanks for the reply David. I don’t know how common it is here in the USA as I just started with oncology. 
I just got out of orientation and I am thinking of leaving.