Gauze vs. plastic for peripheral intravenous dressings: testing a new technology.

The authors conducted a randomized, prospective, controlled trial of three different dressings for peripheral intravenous catheters in 301 acutely ill medical inpatients. Catheters were dressed with dry clean gauze or one of two brands of transparent plastic. The gauze dressings remained in place significantly longer (47 hours median) than either Uniflex (39 hours) of Tegaderm (32 hours) transparent plastic dressings (p = 0.026). Catheters were removed for complications (inflammation, mechanical failure, or infiltration) in 35% of the gauze group, compared with 58% of the Uniflex group and 48% of the Tegaderm group (p = 0.015). Not only were inflamed venipuncture sites seen less often with gauze, inflammation occurred later (p = 0.002) and with lesser severity. Dry gauze dressings resulted in longer catheter life, lower complication rates, and less expense than transparent plastic dressings for peripheral intravenous catheters.