Infection control and hospital epidemiology : the official journal of the Society of Hospital Epidemiologists of America
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Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol · Dec 1989
Randomized Controlled Trial Comparative Study Clinical TrialMicrobial contamination of arterial infusions used for hemodynamic monitoring: a randomized trial of contamination with sampling through conventional stopcocks versus a novel closed system.
Arterial catheters are now commonly used to monitor blood pressure and obtain blood samples for arterial blood gas and other laboratory determinations. Stopcocks inserted into the pressure monitoring circuit have been the primary means of obtaining blood from arterial catheters. However, these stopcock systems have been associated with nosocomial contamination and bacteremias. ⋯ We found that use of the novel sampling system resulted in significantly fewer episodes of internal bacterial contamination of the arterial monitoring line (7%) than did the use of a stopcock system (61%). External contamination of the sampling port was also lower in the novel system (8%) than in the stopcock system (37%). This suggests that the closed system may reduce the risk of nosocomial infections in patients requiring arterial pressure monitoring.