Open AccessEfficacy and Usability of a Novel Barrier Device for Preventing Injection Port Contamination: A Pilot Simulation Study
Author(s) -
David B. Wax,
Anjan Shah,
Ronak Shah,
Hung-Mo Lin,
Daniel Katz
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
anesthesia and analgesia/anesthesia and analgesia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.404
H-Index - 201
eISSN - 1526-7598
pISSN - 0003-2999
DOI - 10.1213/ane.0000000000004235
Subject(s) - medicine , bioburden , interquartile range , usability , contamination , confidence interval , port (circuit theory) , surgery , ecology , human–computer interaction , computer science , electrical engineering , biology , engineering
Contamination of intravenous (IV) ports and stopcocks has been associated with postoperative infections. We tested the usability and efficacy of a novel passive shielding device to prevent such contamination even in the absence of hand hygiene or port disinfection. In a desktop setting with deliberately contaminated hands, qualitative port contamination was detected after 5/60 (8.3%; 95% confidence interval [CI], 2.8-18.4) control port injections versus 0/60 (0%; 95% CI, 0-6.0) shielded injections (P = .025). In clinical simulations with a quantitative bioburden assay (measured in relative light units [RLUs]), median (interquartile range [IQR]) postsimulation bioburden was 46 (32-53) vs 27 (21-42) RLU for the control versus intervention groups (P = .036), yielding a median shift of -13 RLU (95% CI, -2 to -26) in favor of the shielding. Usability of the device was acceptable to practitioners.