Effect of Education of Health Care Workers on the Maintenance of Venous Access Devices

Overview

In intensive care units (ICU), critically ill patients require various venous access devices for fluid resuscitation, drug therapy, or renal replacement therapy (RRT). These include peripheral intravenous catheters (PIVC), specialized venous ports like central venous catheters (CVCs), and hemodialysis ports. The investigators plan to do this pre- and post-intervention study to know the effect of intensive training and education of HCW (doctors and nurses) on the condition of venous access devices in critically ill patients.

Phase 1, pre-intervention: The first twelve weeks will include 25 random visits to main ICU and point observations of all venous access devices under parameters like condition of dressing, connectors and documentation. This will also include the comparison of incidence of CLABSI in the pre and post intervention phase. Phase 2, intervention: Next four weeks will be an intervention in the form of intensive training and education of the HCW (doctors and nurses). The intensive training will be in the form of an online presentation in which the investigators would have videos on care and maintenance of venous access devices, and the importance of documentation of days of insertion and change of dressing. Phase 3, post-intervention: Another twelve weeks, post-intervention, again 25 random visits will be done to collect point observations about the same parameters of venous access devices and documentation as done in phase 1. Statistical analysis: Each of these point observation parameters (for central or peripheral venous access) will be finally categorized as appropriate/inappropriate as per guidelines for best practice. The compiled data from pre and post intervention phases would be compared. All the categorical parameters (appropriate/inappropriate) will be compared using chi-square test. All the quantitative parameters (e.g. incidence of CLABSI) will be compared using a paired t-test

Conditions