Safe care transitions for patients receiving parenteral nutrition.

Transitions of care require coordination between inpatient healthcare providers, care managers, outpatient/ambulatory providers, and the patient/caregiver and family members. Poor communication during transitions of care can affect health outcomes and economic costs for patients/caregivers, healthcare providers, and healthcare systems. The goal of this paper is to identify risk-prone processes in the transition of care for patients requiring parenteral nutrition (PN) between healthcare environments, including the hospital, home, skilled nursing facility, and long-term acute care hospital settings.

Update on the Use of Filters for Parenteral Nutrition: An ASPEN Position Paper.

Intravenous in-line filters play a critical role in promoting patient safety during parenteral nutrition (PN) administration. Guidelines for using filters for PN have been issued by a number of professional organizations and manufacturers of PN components. Yet despite this guidance, filter use remains controversial.

Investigation of the role of infusate properties related to midline catheter failure in an ovine model.

Purpose: Infusate osmolarity, pH, and cytotoxicity were investigated as risk factors for midline catheter failure.

Methods: An experimental, randomized, controlled, blinded trial was conducted using an ovine model. Two 10-cm, 18-gauge single-lumen midline catheters were inserted into the cephalic veins of sheep.

Home Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition During Natural Disasters: A Guide for Clinicians and Consumers.

Natural disasters are most often weather related but can also be unrelated to weather. Either way, these disrupt "normal" life for a short or extended period of time. When someone depends on electricity, clean water, and transportation services for life-sustaining therapies such as home nutrition support, it is important to have a plan in place-even if it is never used.

Hydration Strategy for Endurance Running in an Athlete Requiring Home Parenteral Nutrition.

Purpose: The purpose of this report is to share our experience with optimizing home parenteral nutrition (HPN) and hydration therapy for an HPN consumer who desired to run a marathon.

Methods: A 34-year-old woman with idiopathic gastroparesis necessitating HPN and intravenous (IV) hydration desired to train for a marathon. For short runs, prerun and/or postrun hydration were adequate, but a marathon (26.

Micronutrients in parenteral nutrition: too little or too much? The past, present, and recommendations for the future.

This research workshop in 2009 grew out of a concern in the United States, Europe, and other countries with advanced medicine that it was time to revisit the parenteral requirements for a number of micronutrients. Critical questions sought to be answered included the following: Were there micronutrients not routinely added that should be part of a parenteral nutrition (PN) formula? Were other micronutrients present but in inappropriate amounts? How are various micronutrient requirements altered in the critically or chronically ill?