Terminology?

Nurses General Nursing

Published

A few years ago, while I was still in nursing school, one of my instructors referred to a heplock as a "Vicra." She said that's what they used to be called, but it's not really proper terminology since it's a brand name. When I recently mentioned this to my nursing supervisor, she had no idea what I was talking about. Now I can't even find this term using online search engines. Does this sound familiar to anyone else?

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Specializes in obstetrics(high risk antepartum, L/D,etc.

I've been around longer than dirt, and I've never heard a heplock called "Vicra". I've heard "Buff-cap" , "access port", some others that I can't even think of. "Vicra" is a new one on me.

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Specializes in Hospice, Critical Care.

At my facility it's called an INP...intermittent needleless port. Took me a while to get used to that. Never heard of a Vicra. Never heard of buff-cap, either :)

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I've heard 'em called 'locks', 'wells', 'cap', ...lots of terms but Vicra is not one I've heard --must be a local slang somewhere! LOL!

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This term was used by one particular instructor on several different occasions during preconference--Mrs. Smith has such-and-such disorder, is on O2 at 2L, with a Vicra in the left forearm. Then when she started calling it a heplock, I questioned her about the difference between a Vicra and a heplock. She responded that it used to be called a Vicra, but since that's a brand name, it's really not proper to be referring to it as such. She said these days such access ports are often flushed with saline, not heparin, anyway, so even the term "heplock" is becoming outdated. To simplify things in my mind, I decided to remember the first term taught, Vicra.

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Never heard that term. Heplock or saline lock are the 2 most commonly used terms in my neck of the woods.

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