[Central venous catheters in children with cancer. Risk of complications. One centre experience]

To describe the incidence and type of central venous catheters (CVC) complications in children treated for solid tumours.

Between 1997-2005, 500 paediatric patients were treated for cancer. The CVC complications were analyzed according to the CVC type, blood product transfusion (BT) and parenteral nutrition (TPN). Chi-square test was used for statistics.

For 566 surgically inserted CVCs: 147 (25.8%) were ports, 413 (73,6%) tunnelled catheters: Broviacs--227 (39.9%), Groshongs--186 (32.7%) and other--6 (1%). total number of CVC days was 288 944, (median: 422, range: 2-2583). 297 complications (rate of 1.02/1000 CVC days) were observed: 81 catheter infections (0.28), 77 mechanical complications (0.266), 59 no aspiration events (0.204), 52 thrombotic occlusions (0.179) and 28 tunnel infections (0.096). At the end of the study period 121 (28%) CVCs were prematurely removed due to: infection (52), mechanical cause (49), thrombotic occlusion (14), no aspiration (6). Mechanical complications in catheters comparing to ports were more frequent (p= 0.007). There were more infections in Broviacs than Groshongs catheters (p=0.022) and in children receiving BT and TPN (p=0.046 and 0.003).

CVC's related complications were relatively rare. Most common were infections and concerned catheters and these complications were most frequent in patients receiving BP and TPN. Risk of mechanical complications was higher in catheters than ports.