Impact of terminal tip location of midline catheters on catheter‐related complications and indwelling duration in elderly patients

Abstract

Peripheral venous catheters (PVCs) are a common and essential device used worldwide for the infusion of intravenous (IV) fluid, parenteral nutrition support and other important clinical interventions (McCallum & Higgins, 2012). PVCs are classified into three major categories: peripheral intravenous catheters (PIVCs), long peripheral catheters (LPCs) and midline catheters (MCs;Gorski et al., 2021).PIVCs are easy to insert, but the average detaining time for adults is only 44 hr. Thus, they are only suitable for short-term infusion in patients (Hadaway, 2012;Kollar, 2021). LPCs have been recently introduced into clinical practice and provide an alternative means of peripheral venous access in acute inpatients with difficult venous access (Qin et al., 2021). However, as LPCs are not yet broadly used, the risk of complications remains to be evaluated in large controlled studies (Badger, 2019).Midline catheters are typically 20-30 cm in length and are inserted into the peripheral veins of the upper arm with placement terminating