title: Contamination of central venous catheters in immunocompromised patients: a comparison between two different types of central venous catheters.
abstract: Catheters impregnated with silver have been proposed as a means of reducing catheter-related infection. We therefore performed a prospective randomized study to compare a new silver-impregnated central venous catheter (CVC) with a commercially available CVC in a cohort of immunocompromised patients. We studied 157 patients of whom 97 could be analysed. The median indwelling time in the study group (SC) was 10.5 days and 11 days in the control group (CC). The incidence of contamination in the SC group was 15.6 vs 24.6 in the CC group referring to 1000 catheter days. In both groups, we found 6% of catheter-related infections according to the definitions of a published scoring system. The differences between the two groups were not significant. We conclude that the SC decrease the incidence of catheter contamination and may have a positive effect on the reduction of CVC-related infections.
authors.affiliation: Department of Internal Medicine I (Division of Infectious Diseases and Chemotherapy), University of Vienna, Austria. brigitte.stoiser@akh-wien.ac.at
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Stoiser
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kofler
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Staudinger
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Georgopoulos
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Lugauer
authors.forename: J P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Guggenbichler
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Burgmann
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Frass
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002405:Catheterization, Central Venous / Q000009:adverse effects* / Q000295:instrumentation; D002408:Catheters, Indwelling / Q000382:microbiology*; D004203:Disinfection; D004866:Equipment Contamination; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D016867:Immunocompromised Host; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011140:Polyurethanes; D011446:Prospective Studies; D018805:Sepsis / Q000209:etiology* / Q000517:prevention & control; D012834:Silver
chemical_list: D011140:Polyurethanes; D012834:Silver