[Efforts toward Venous Access of Anti-Cancer Drug by Nurses]

Our hospital has an established outpatient chemotherapy room, and medical doctors have accessed veins for infusion so far. We trialed venous access by nurses for the purpose of managing safe and proper cancer chemotherapy, reducing the work of doctors, and reducing patient waiting time. A questionnaire was conducted in June 2013, and nurses secured routes at 19 facilities(58%)of the 33 national university hospitals. In November of the same year, the working group was established, and from September 2016 to March 2017, lectures, practical skills, a paper test, and a practical test were conducted; successful applicants were approved as in-hospital certified nurses. From April 2017, we started intravenous injection of anti-cancer drugs by nurses in outpatient chemotherapy rooms and always waiting for doctor in chemotherapy room. There have been many favorable reports of reduced pain and less route failure from patients, and issues, such as extravasation and dyspnea, have not occurred yet. The doctors who were interrupting their work by 29 minutes(20 minutes to and from the patient for a 9-minute procedure)could concentrate on their own tasks. However, patient waiting time increased from 14 minutes to 21 minutes because the amount of work for nurses increased. In the future, reducing the burden on nurses, for example, by increasing the number of nurses, is warranted.