(K1) The Compassionate Path for DIVAs: Enhancing Experience for Difficult IV Access Patients

This presentation outlines the journey of implementing a new workflow to address the challenges faced with difficult intravenous access (DIVA) patients. A pre-implementation patient survey identified patient dissatisfaction with multiple failed attempts, painful insertion, & inexperience of inserter. Patients verbalized preference for vascular access specialist. This team implemented a formal process to equip clinical staff with accessible resources for managing patients who meet the evidence-based criteria for difficult intravenous (IV) access. Using a Systematic Review published in 2021, we determined the VAT (Vascular Access Team) staff are the experts who should manage the vascular access needs for these patients in order to avoid the unnecessary pain and discomfort associated with certain escalation pathways that rely on a specific number of traditional access attempts before escalation.
Impact of the initiative: ~400 chart audits were conducted comparing data pre and post delegation of DIVA in EMR. Patients had less PIV insertions/encounter compared to previous encounters & increase in PIV dwell time that lasted for entire LOS.