TY - JOUR T1 - Incidence and identification of inadvertent lumbar vein catheterisation in the NICU JF - Archives of Disease in Childhood - Fetal and Neonatal Edition JO - Arch Dis Child Fetal Neonatal Ed SP - F277 LP - F278 DO - 10.1136/archdischild-2014-307095 VL - 100 IS - 3 AU - Sajeev Job AU - Sudeep Damodaran AU - Peter Brooke AU - Jonathan Mo AU - Fred Pickworth AU - Paul Clarke Y1 - 2015/05/01 UR - http://fn.bmj.com/content/100/3/F277.abstract N2 - A potential complication of percutaneously inserted central venous catheters (PCVCs) is inadvertent lodgement in an ascending lumbar vein (ALV; figure 1). Associated morbidities include epidural extravasation of parenteral nutrition, seizures, quadriplegia and death.1 The incidence of ALV catheter malposition is unknown. We aimed to (1) determine the incidence of ALV catheter malposition in our neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) and (2) survey current UK practices regarding use of radiopaque contrast for checking PCVC position.Figure 1 Catheter malposition in left ascending lumbar vein (ALV) readily indicated by classical spiral-patterned vertebral venogram seen after contrast injection. Note also the kinking of the catheter in the iliac vein. We routinely inject radiopaque contrast medium (0.2–0.3 mL of Omnipaque 300 mg iodine/mL; GE Healthcare) to verify PCVC position and record details of all PCVCs inserted into a bespoke electronic database. We interrogated this database for cases of suspected ALV malposition and cross-referenced with a separate, prospectively maintained list … ER -