Abstract

Introduction: In patients with peripheral venous catheters (PVC), performing flushing is an essential procedure to maintain catheter patency and prevent complications. Although flushing is highly advisable, compliance is low and it is not usually documented. Pre-filled saline syringes used for routine flushing of PVC offer several advantages. Methodology: A randomized controlled trial study is conducted in a tertiary care hospital at Pondicherry for a period of one month in 2024 among 34 patients receiving intermittent intravenous medicine. Participants were selected by using consecutive sampling technique and divided into experimental and control group using random number tables. Experimental group (17 participants) received flushing of PVC with prefilled syringe for 3 days and control group received flushing of PVC using normal saline. Patency of PVC was assessed every 12 hours. Results: The result shows that there is no statistically significant difference between experimental and control group on patency of peripheral intravenous cannula with p value 0.214. Discussion: From the finding of this study it can be concluded that, 0.9% normal saline flush and pre filled syringe are having the same effect in maintaining the patency of peripheral intravenous cannula by preventing the occlusion formation in PVC.

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