Central Line-Associated Blood Stream Infections - Essay Example

"Central Line-Associated Blood Stream Infections" is a great example of a paper on infections.
According to a CDC report released in 2011, it estimated that over 18,000 Central line-associated bloodstream infections (CLABSIs) were reported in US intensive care units, and over 23,000 reported from inpatient wards (Mazher, Kallen, Edwards, & Donlan, 2013). In another study by Sweet, Cumpston, Briggs, Craig, & Hamadani (2012), they identified that the presence or use of a central venous catheter (CVC) creates a serious risk factor for CLABSI especially when the patients are immunocompromised and have malignant disorders. From these studies, the main setting in which this problem occurs is in areas the insertion of central catheters often occurs which include intensive care units (ICU), long-term care, neonatal intensive care units, wards, and specialty areas (CDC, 2015).

CDC (2015) defines CLABSI as “A laboratory-confirmed bloodstream infection (LCBI) where the central line (CL) or umbilical catheter (UC) was in place for more than two days”. CLABSI infections have been strongly associated with central line care. A common cause of CLABSI infection in patients has been related to poor handling and disinfection of the central line needleless connectors and hubs, which leads to contamination of the catheter’s internal lumen with bacteria that cause the infection (Mazher, Kallen, Edwards, & Donlan, 2013; Wawrzyniak, et al., 2014)).

CLABSI infections are a serious healthcare concern. Some of the common issues associated with the infection include prolonged hospital stay of patients, increased cost, and the risk of mortality (Mazher, Kallen, Edwards, & Donlan, 2013). In 2002, over 250,000 patients were diagnosed with bloodstream infections, and over 30,000 deaths reported that year as a result of these infections (Sweet, Cumpston, Briggs, Craig, & Hamadani, 2012). In the study by DeVries, Mancos, & Valentine (2014), they identified that lack of proper equipment to treat infections such as CLABSI and the increased infection rate, promoted a high nurse turnover, patient dissatisfaction, and poor performance of the hospital in delivering health care.

There is a need to address the problem from a nursing perspective since the nurse is directly linked to the occurrence of the infection. In most hospitals, nurses are responsible for the insertion of a peripherally inserted central catheter (PICC) or central intravenous (IV) line. Therefore, they are directly responsible for the improper handling of central line needleless connectors and hubs, which increases the risk of infection. A rate of 41,000 patients per year is quite high for something that can be easily prevented with proper care and guidelines being enforced. The study by DeVries, Mancos, & Valentine (2014) showed that engaging nurses in choosing the technology to address the problem and the policy creation stage significantly improved the outcomes of the project. Nurses play a major role in the cause and prevention of these infections; therefore, they gain a lot more from the knowledge and information provided towards the understanding and prevention of this problem.

There are several solutions proposed to address this issue, including a clear guideline for nurses provided by CDC on the various steps and strategies to minimize the infection rate. The main idea, that has been adopted by many researchers, is to disinfect catheter hub access ports before and after each use (Wawrzyniak, et al., 2014). Disinfection of these hubs by alcohol has always been a recommended choice, however, research has shown that about 70% of the time isopropyl alcohol was used to swab these surfaces, entry of microorganisms still occurred (Oto, Imanaka, Konno, Nakataki, & Nishimura, 2011). Other studies have shown that disinfection caps were successful in reducing CLABSI infections ((Wawrzyniak et al., 2014; Wright, et al., 2013). Therefore, this study will be investigating if the use of alcohol-impregnated port protector caps decreases the number of central line-associated bloodstream infections.