UVC catheter infiltration

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Does it happen? Has anyone here seen it? In say a 33 week neonate who had a UVC placed during resuscitation. The UVA was dc'd after a day but the UVC catheter remained. I'm trying to figure out if it was a nursing error or a physician error. Maybe the physician didn't advance enough or advanced it too far..say into the hepatic vein. The babies entire tummy got infiltrated.

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Specializes in Peds/Neo CCT,Flight, ER, Hem/Onc.

Breaanne are you a nurse or the parent of this child? It sounds a little like you are fishing for ammunition for a lawsuit. At any rate. None of us were there. None of us saw the x-ray confirming placement. None of us saw the baby after. So anything we could say would be purely speculation on our parts and not particularly helpful or accurate. Your options are twofold. If you are the parent or relative bring your concerns to the physician caring for the infant and let him explain what happened. If you are the nurse caring for the baby you can speak with the physician or your nurse educator to clarify what happened and how to prevent it in the future. Either way, best regards and wishes that the child improves.

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Does it happen? Has anyone here seen it? In say a 33 week neonate who had a UVC placed during resuscitation. The UVA was dc'd after a day but the UVC catheter remained. I'm trying to figure out if it was a nursing error or a physician error. Maybe the physician didn't advance enough or advanced it too far..say into the hepatic vein. The babies entire tummy got infiltrated.

I am an RN doing research for a case study. I am trying to decide which is more likely. I couldn't find information on the web about whether or not they infiltrate and I have never worked in the NICU. My experience is ER and Oncology so as you can imagine I am not well versed in this area. Any info would be appreciated.

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Specializes in Peds/Neo CCT,Flight, ER, Hem/Onc.

Thanks for clearing that up. Sorry if I sounded suspicious but we get a lot of non-nursing folks on here pimping us for info they can use against their doctor/nurse. Do you have access to a NICU where you can interview a NNP or neonatologist? They might be able to get you copies of x-rays and such which would be interesting.

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Specializes in Critical Care, ED, Cath lab, CTPAC,Trauma.

It is difficult to answer these questions out of context and the actual cause can be from various a wide variety of sources to.....sometimes this just happens. It is difficult to place direct blame on one individual.Google is your friend.....

Let me google that for you

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Specializes in Nurse Scientist-Research.

I'm not saying it couldn't happen, but I've never heard of it before. Just saying, not very common. Most common complications of UVC's would be infection and being placed too far in. In NRP, they teach that in a delivery room emergency, one can place an emergency UVC in just a few centimeters to administer emergency medications. UAC's are much more prone to complications.

ETA:

Maybe this thread would be better off in the NICU forum?

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Specializes in NICU, PICU, PACU.

I have seen 2, and it because of improper placement and it is in the liver. It doesn't infiltrate, per say, but it can cause a nasty abcess. Sometimes they migrate too, and even if it looks okay on the xray, it can migrate. We don't routinely xray to check placement every day. The only usual sign is that the abdominal girth starts going up, your pump may say occluded, and the kid gets sick as all get out.

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