Best Practice for Delivering Small-Volume Intermittent Intravenous Infusions

Area of Science:

• Pharmacology
• Clinical Pharmacy
• Drug Delivery Systems

Background:

• Small-volume intermittent intravenous (IV) infusions are common in clinical practice.
• Accurate medication delivery is crucial for patient safety and therapeutic efficacy.
• Residual volume in IV administration sets can lead to underdosing.

Purpose of the Study:

• To quantify medication loss associated with different administration methods for small-volume intermittent IV infusions.
• To identify the factors influencing medication loss, including administration method and solution volume.
• To provide evidence-based recommendations for optimizing intermittent IV infusion delivery.

Main Methods:

• Laboratory evaluation of medication loss using 6 distinct administration methods.
• Testing with both 50-mL and 100-mL solution volumes.
• Calculation of residual medication volume for each method and volume.

Main Results:

• Significant variations in calculated medication loss were observed across the 6 administration methods.
• The percentage of medication loss was greater with 50-mL solutions compared to 100-mL solutions.
• Up to 35% of the administered medication could be lost due to residual volume in the IV administration set.

Conclusions:

• The choice of administration method significantly impacts medication delivery efficiency for intermittent IV infusions.
• Smaller infusion volumes (50 mL) are more susceptible to substantial medication loss.
• Intermittent IV infusions should ideally be administered as a secondary infusion through a primary administration set that allows for flushing to minimize residual volume and ensure complete drug delivery.