When a patient is admitted to your hospital with an indwelling central line, what is your policy / practice for confirming the tip location prio to use? Is a chest film report from the referring hospital sufficient? What if the chest film results are a week old; a month old; or > 6 months old? Or do you automatically get a repeat chest film to re-confirm all central line tip locations on admission to your institution?
Any and all responses are greatly appreciated...
Many thanks,
Robert Ferdinand BSN, RN, CRNI
IV Therapy Coordinator
Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital
125 Nashua St., 10th floor rm. 1001
Boston, MA 02114
Office: 617-573-7136
Pager: 61172
Several years ago, the general consensus among IV nurses at a Southeastern Chapter, INS conference was to get a repeat chest xray on all patients with CVC at admission. There is a new Infusion Nursing Standard on CVAD Malposition also that might be helpful. Lynn
Lynn Hadaway, M.Ed., RN, BC, CRNI
Lynn Hadaway Associates, Inc.
126 Main Street, PO Box 10
Milner, GA 30257
Website http://www.hadawayassociates.com
Office Phone 770-358-7861
Here at the Charles George VA, we have adopted the practice of obtaining a chest x-ray on anyone admitted with a PICC in place. We actually created an order set that includes the chest x-ray, the flushes, the PRN Cathflo and the dressing changes-things that usually get overlooked.
We put in the policy to obtain an X-ray to confirm placement prior to using the line here in Bath, NY. ~Laura BSN, RN, CRNI~
~Laura Bess BSN, RN, CRNI~