[External jugular vein as central venous access in intensive care patients]

The authors studied 98 patients in need of a central venous line route, joined into two different groups: Group 1 - 62 (63.3%) patients, and Group 2 - 36 (36.7%). All the patients had a visible external jugular vein while on Trendelenburg position. According to the Seldinger technique using a J-wire guided catheter the authors describe a maneuver to make it easy to advance the catheter. Patients from Group 1 had the technique applied by operators with previous experience, and patients from Group 2 by operators with no previous experience, but under supervision. There was no significant difference in the success rate between these two groups: 96.8% in Group 1 and 94.4% in Group 2 (p > 0.5). There was only one case of local bleeding, managed by local compression.