Arterial Line Complications

arterial line complications arterial lines complications invasive blood pressure monitoring patient safety May 06, 2024
Arterial lines are great, but your team must be aware of the possible complications. The common arterial cannulation sites are the radial, brachial and femoral artery. Each site has a different risk profile. Throughout the patient’s episode of care, we must remain vigilant about complications to keep our patients safe. 👀✅
 
Here’s an outline:
 
👉🏾 Immediate
🔺Pain (awake patient)
🔺Bleeding (especially with unrecognised disconnection or intraperitoneal perforation of iliac artery)
🔺Haematoma/bruising (failed cannulation)
🔺Nerve damage (needle trauma to nearby nerves)
 
👉🏾 Early
🔺Air bubble emboli
🔺Inaccurate reading leading to inappropriate treatment
🔺Ischaemia (with poor collateral circulation)
 
👉🏾 Late
🔺Thrombus*
🔺Infection (local or systemic)
🔺Haematoma/bruising
🔺Compartment syndrome (brachial artery)
🔺Pseudoaneursym
 
*Around 20% of radial arterial lines will thrombose and remain occluded for around 3 weeks, however, only 1% of these will cause ischaemia requiring intervention.
 
Build knowledge ✅
Improve safety ✅
 
Ref:
https://ccforum.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/cc1489
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK556127/

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