Powerglide/powerwand

[ritrit]

Have any of you used a extended dwell piv? We are currently looking at the powerglide, but have not heard anything great about them. Do you use these at your hospital? What are the pros and cons of these catheters? What is the difference between the powerglide and powerwand? How were you able to implement them in your facility? How did you bill for this device? Thank you.

[Asystole RN]

I've only used the PowerGlide and played with the PowerWand.

We billed them as midlines and treated them just like any other midline, except we could power inject through the PowerGlide.

The PowerGlide works great on people with great veins, but how many of those patients do we see? We've had a rather high failure to insert rate with the PowerGlide that just does not make it economical for use to carry the catheter anymore.

Vascular access nurses are fencers, we use a light and delicate touch, but the PowerGlide is a broadsword. When you are accessing a vein with the introducer needle it is light and transmits the feel of the tissue and vessel well. The same goes for the guide-wire, you can feel when the cannulation is good. The size, weight, and how everything is bundled and touching in the PowerGlide deteriorates the ability of the nurse to feel the insertion process.

We asked ourselves what the advantage of the PowerGlide was and we could not come up with one. The nice thing with actual midlines is that they are long so that you can trim them to the length you need and really place them in the ideal location. We asked ourselves what is stopping us from inserting a longer PIV, inserting it with max barrier, and calling it a midline? Nothing.

A midline is no longer defined by length but is rather defined by how and where the catheter is inserted. Considering how the INS and CDC are supporting unlimited dwells for PIVs and the advantages of traditional midlines we did not see the advantage for PowerGlides.