Incidence, complications, and costs of peripheral venous catheter-related bacteraemia: a retrospective, single-centre study.

BACKGROUND: Peripheral venous catheter (PVC) complications occur on average in approximately half of patients, necessitating premature PVC removal, suspending administration of ongoing therapies, and catheter replacement. AIM: To estimate the current incidence, complications, and costs of bloodstream infection (BSI) attributable to PVCs. METHODS: Patients with PVC-related BSI (cases) were matched with patients without PVC-related BSI (controls). FINDINGS: From January 1st, 2018 to March 31st, 2020, a total of 9833 out of 113,068 patients visiting the emergency department (9%) were hospitalized in a medical ward after insertion of a PVC. Among them, 581 (6%) had at least one positive blood culture. Twenty-five (4%) of these were judged as having a PVC-related BSI. Major complications were noted in nine patients. One patient presented severe sepsis requiring admission to intensive care unit for eleven days followed by thoracic (T4-T7) spondylodiscitis requiring prolonged antimicrobial therapy. Another patient developed mitral valve endocarditis also requiring prolonged antimicrobial therapy. One patient developed a pre-sacral abscess three months after initial PVC infection and required hospital readmission for 19 days for drainage. Median (interquartile range) hospital stay costs were €11,597 (8,479-23,759) for cases and €6,789 (4,019-10,764) for controls, leading to median additional costs of €5,587. CONCLUSION: Though the risk of developing PVC-related BSI in patients admitted to medical wards may seem low, complications of PVC-related BSI are severe, and associated mortality remains high. The financial resources used to treat these complications could be better spent on prevention, including the use of high-quality materials and technologies, and improved training of healthcare providers.

[Hospital pathway of patients with breast cancer]. / Trajectoires hospitalières des patientes atteintes de cancer du sein en Poitou-Charentes.

Health care network should promote better quality, equity and care efficacy. On the subject of breast cancer, literature has shown inequality in care depending on geographical areas and health centres locations. This article illustrates a method of analysis of female non in situ non metastatic breast cancer patients hospital care pathway, from the 2002 and 2003 Poitou-Charentes' county Diagnosis Related Groups (DRG's) data bases. The treatments several phases are described along with their combination. The number of chemotherapy and radiotherapy sessions per patient are each analysed for comparison between Health Centres, Health Centres Status, and in view of the referentials recommendations. Several health pathways options are quantified: Mono/pluri Health Centres sites, inside/outside a geographical department, inside/outside Poitou-Charentes county. Nine hundred and nine patients hospital care pathways are described. Surgery was more often partial (66%), with Health Centres variation between 17 and 68%. Among the 308 patients who had chemotherapy, 78% received between 4 and 6 sessions, with variation per Health Centre between 65 and 90%. Radiotherapy is difficult to trace because of the Health Centres non systematic radiotherapy sessions linkage, and private Health Centres lack of information (no DRG's). 91% of identified radiotherapy benefiting patients had 25 to 35 sessions, in conformation with recommendations depending on the surgery performed with Health Centres variation ratio between 76 and 96%. Hospital care pathways options between two type of treatments were identified. 90% of the hospital care pathways took place in the same geographical department, and 30% took place in public Health Centres alone. Despite radiotherapy tractability limits, proper DRG's data collection allows the description of health pathways between Health Centres and allows health practice disparity identification. Using this tool, in accordance with the Cancer Plan, can therefore help health networks in evaluating care pathway in cancer and many other fields.