Catheter Connections' vascular access disinfecting cap gets US clearance
This article was originally published in Clinica
Executive Summary
The US FDA has granted 510(k) clearance for DualCap, a device developed by Catheter Connections (Salt Lake City, Utah) to disinfect IV access points, the needleless injection site (NIS) and the male luer – a type of connector fitting – at the end of the IV tubing. Patients contract catheter-related bloodstream infections when microbes enter the bloodstream in one of two ways. The less prevalent route is from the skin at the catheter insertion site. The more common route is intraluminal contamination, when the two primary IV access points, the NIS and the male luer, become contaminated. There are nearly 500,000 cases every year with a 12-25% mortality rate in the US. DualCap will go on sale in the US in the second half of 2010.