Establishing an Ultrasound-Guided Vascular Access Program
Axis Imaging News
Judy Padula, MSN, RN and Matthew Ostroff, ARNP
Establishing vascular access is one of the most commonly performed medical procedures and plays a central role in patient care. However, obtaining PIV access is difficult in about 35% of patients who present to the emergency department. Ultrasound-guided vascular access can help address this issue, but a hospital must first create a program to educate clinicians in leveraging POCUS for this procedure. Nurses Judy Padula and Matthew Ostroff outline five steps in establishing an ultrasound-guided vascular access program: Identify and satisfy unmet needs, locate the safest, most cost-effective catheter site with ultrasound, use ultrasound-guided PIVs as an alternative to high-risk central lines, recognize the vital role nurse leadership can play in implementing a successful vascular access program, and leverage the nurse/physician partnership to optimize patient care.
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What is ERAS (Enhanced Recovery after Surgery) and How Is It Supporting Better Patient Outcomes?
DOTMed HealthCareBusiness NewsPhilip Corvo, MD, MA, FACSDr. Philip Corvo serves as chairman of the Stanley J. Dudrick Department Surgery and Director of Surgical Critical Care at Saint Mary's Hospital, Trinity Health Of New England, located in Waterbury, Connecticut. He leads an innovative ERAS (Enhanced Recovery after Surgery) program which is helping reduce opioid use, speeding patient recovery and reducing costs. DOTMed interviewed Dr. Corvo about the program he leads, in which he discusses the financial impact of ERAS, how to establish an ERAS program, and patient success stories. …
Emergency Physician Brings Ultrasound to Rural Guatemala
Emergency physician Dr. Elijah Katz has worked with Sonosite ultrasound machines for several clinical and teaching missions around the world. Point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) is a large part of Dr. Katz’s practice both at home and abroad, and he currently serves as a Fellow in Combined Clinical Ultrasound and Global Health in the Department of Emergency Medicine at University of Texas, San Antonio. …
Medical Mission to Kenya Introduces High School Students to Ultrasound
Dr. Martin Kelly is an attending physician in the Emergency Medicine Residency Program at Darnall Army Medical Center, Fort Hood, Texas. He has been involved in mission trips for 15 years, most of them in conjunction with Maranatha Volunteers International located in Sacramento, California. Dr. Kelly was kind enough to write a report about this nonprofit and its collaboration with Sonosite. …
New Government Recommendations Advance Interventional Approaches to Improve Pain Management
POCUS for Emergency Medicine Helps Save Lives
Emergency physicians must make life-saving decisions as quickly as possible to choose the correct treatment and direct patients to an appropriate hospital. Emergency department chief Dr. Sylvain Benenati and emergency doctor Dr. David Sapir, both from Melun Hospital in France, discuss how the dynamic nature of point-of-care ultrasound makes it invaluable in these busy environments.
POCUS on the Road …
Learning to Master Ultrasound-Guided Pain Control in Zambia
Consultant and trainee anesthetists from Surrey, England traveled to Lusaka, Zambia with a point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) system to train Zambian colleagues in ultrasound-guided regional anesthesia. Dr. Madankumar Narayanan describes the educational objectives of the visit and the enthusiastic response from doctors in Zambia, as the team demonstrated the benefits of ultrasound-guided interventions in classroom workshops and on patients.
Responding to a Need in Zambia …
Humanitarian Doctor Returns to Haiti with Sonosite M-Turbo
In our June 2017 blog post, we reported on gynecologist/obstetrician Dr. Audrey “Dree” Stryker’s mission with the IWISH Foundation to Haiti with the M-Turbo. Dr. Stryker recently sent our Sonosite Global Health program another report from her most recent medical mission to Haiti. She had borrowed a Sonosite M-Turbo with C60x and ICTx transducers from the Global Health Loaner Pool. …
Addressing Addiction and Pain Management in Our Nation’s Military and Veteran Populations
Charitable Medical Mission Uses Ultrasound for Maternal Care in Zambia
Australian nonprofit Globalinks Medical Foundation is dedicated to providing healthcare to global communities in remote locations where access to healthcare services is limited. Globalinks was founded by Dr. Peter Locke and his wife Carolyn following their experiences volunteering overseas, where they witnessed a prevalence of of illness, disease, and child mortality rates, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. …
A Solid Future for ICU Ultrasound
Point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) has become an established tool for the rapid assessment and diagnosis of patients across a variety of medical disciplines, not least in the high-pressure environment of intensive care medicine. …
U.S. Government Report Provides Recommendations and Opportunities during National Pain Management Month
Operation Restore Hope Uses Sonosite iViz for Charitable Dental Mission
Operation Restore Hope is an Australia-based surgical charity for less fortunate children in the Philippines with birth defects and deformities, especially cleft lip and cleft palate.
ORH was founded in 1993 by Sydney plastic surgeon Dr. Darryl Hodgkinson and has carried out more than 2,500 operations. …
Dr. Trish Henwood Publishes Article about Using POCUS to Treat Ebola
Emergency physician Dr. Trish Henwood, president and co-founder of the PURE Initiative, has been in the frontlines of the battle against Ebola since 2014, when she traveled to Liberia to confront an outbreak. Dr. Henwood recently wrote an article for The New England Journal of Medicine outlining the lessons she has learned since those extremely challenging days. …
Ultrasound Helps Intravenous Line Insertion for Children with Difficult Access
In a July 2019 study published in Annals of Emergency Medicine, researchers determined that ultrasound-guided line insertions improves the first-attempt success rates over traditional palpation methods for children with predicted difficult access. …
Doctor Uses Ultrasound-Guided Injections to Treat Peruvian Farmers
Sports medicine specialist Dr. David Sealy, MD CAQSM works with the Volunteers in Medical Missions, a Christian medical organization that sends 15 to 18 medical missions a year to countries around the world. Dr. Sealy returned from a 10-day trip in the high Andes in Peru, visiting five villages over a five-day period to provide medical care. Dr. …