Protocols for Central Lines Dressing Changes

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HoJO, We recently had to review our policies on central line dressing changes. We had other facilities fax over their policies on the same...and found out that they are doing there dressing changes every mon, wed, and fri. ??? Ours is every 7 days.

I looked in the search on the computer...central venous catheter dressing changes..and found some articles from CDC and APIC and the John Hopkins Center...all recommending..changing the dressings every 7 days..unless they use a gauze then it has to be every 48 hours.

I would be glad to find the articles for you if you still cant find anything. Or if you need to talk about more ideas...I am more that happy to..in fact I am always looking to talk to other medical personnal to throw ideas at...and get new ones.

Please email me if you need or are intereseted in talking or needing more information

my name is Tracy...I am an RN, Infection Control Nurse/ Risk Manager/ Staff Development nurse at a long term care facility

email me at: [email protected]

Our hospital policy is to change central line and PICC line dressings every 96 hours OR if it becomes loose or wet-then we are to change them earlier. On portacaths, we change the dressing every 7 days, unless it is wet or loose as well.

Originally posted by HoJo

I'm curious as to what everyone else's protocol is for central line dssg changes. Currenly where I work we do PICC lines, Midlines, Subclavian, and Jugualar dssg changes Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

I'm wondering is there any research out there dealing with this. Does changing central line dssg's more frequently decrease the risk of infection? Or does it matter at all if you change them once, twice or three times a week?

Any help on this one would be greatly appreciated as I am considering approaching our Nurse Manager about this and if you have any articles about this could you please post the reference for the article. I need somthing I can go on here.

It would not only save me time as a nurse to spend more time with my patients but it would also save my patients money in the healthcare system, for somthing that may not be required (if the research supports it).

J.Johnson R.N.

You need a copy of the INS Infusion Nurses Soceity Standards of Practice

http://www.ins1.org/

You are exposing those lines to too much infection, at the least they should be every 3 days for indwelling Catheters, and once a week for access ports.

Many institutions do their CVC dressing change on Monday and Thursday. Unless needed prn. Most important over anything else, unless this is the intial surgical dressing, never ever ever use gauze over a insertion site for 2 reasons. 1, The gauze covers the access and you can't tell if it is red or draining 2, the gauze absorbs all sweat and grows all bacteria from A to Z. Use only the tegaderm or op site dressings to cover the insertion site.

Barbara CRNI, OCN