Central venous catheter management prior to the start of the dialysis session: a new device to improve a critical procedure.

Background: Central venous catheter (CVC) preparation for a haemodialysis (HD) session is a critical non-standardized manoeuvre.

Methods: We compared the procedure in use at our centre (C) versus the use of Haemocatch® (H), a device recently presented for the management of CVC, in 12 patients, with C during 7 dialysis sessions and H during the subsequent 7 sessions.

Results: Out of 75 HD sessions with C and 75 with H, both the number of connections and disconnections of the CVC via a syringe and the amount of blood wasted during the manoeuvres proved significantly lower with H (2.