Skills of intensive care nurses for central venous catheter care

The study was conducted as a descriptive study to determine the skills of intensive care nurses related to central venous catheter care. The universe of the study consisted of nurses working in adult intensive care units of a university, a state and a private hospital in Istanbul (N=117), and a sample of 37 nurses who agreed to participate in the study. The data were collected by using the Survey on the Descriptive Characteristics of Nurses and Observation Form related to Intensive Care Nurses for Central Venous Catheter Care Skills. Number, percentage, Z test and chi-square test were used to evoluate the data. According to the findings of the study, more than half (75.7%) of the nurses received training on the subject, almost all of them (93.7%) provided hand hygiene before starting the procedure but the rate of providing hand hygiene decreased (40.5 %) after the procedure, that most of them do not wear steril gloves (70.3 %) and masks (75.7%) during care, they did not scrub the hub and flushing and did not keep enough records after the procedure. In the study, it was concluded that nurses did not perform these skills, which are among the critical process steps, at the desired level.In line with the information obtained from the research, it is aimed to include central venous catheter care in the nursing education, it is recommended that in-service training programs for working nurses be shown both theoretically and practically.