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Is ECG‐guidance a helpful method to correctly position a central venous catheter during prehospital emergency care?

2005; Wiley; Volume: 49; Issue: 7 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1111/j.1399-6576.2005.00762.x

1399-6576

Jean David, Karim Tazarourte, J.-P. Perfus, Dominique Savary,

Hemodynamic Monitoring and Therapy

Insertion of a central venous catheter (CVC) in an emergency situation is challenging and may be potentially associated with more complications. Because CVC positioning by ECG-guidance may help to decrease the frequency of a malpositioned catheter, we decided to prospectively evaluate the usefulness of positioning a CVC by ECG-guidance during prehospital emergency care.Prospective observational study during which all patients requiring CVC placement during prehospital care were included. We compared two periods of 1 year during which CVCs were inserted without and then with the help of ECG-guidance.Eighty successive patients were included. We observed a significant reduction of incorrectly positioned CVCs with ECG-guidance (13% vs. 38%, P < 0.05) and a decreased number of chest X-rays needed to verify the position of the CVC (40 vs. 54, P < 0.05).ECG-guidance is a safe and feasible technique which significantly improved the rate of CVCs correctly positioned during prehospital emergency care.