Guidance to help ensure urinary catheters are used appropriately and managed well is now available from the GIRFT programme, supporting NHS teams to offer optimal care and improve patient outcomes.
GIRFT brought together a working group of more than 40 colleagues to develop the guidance, including urologists, nursing colleagues from primary, community and secondary care and the care home sector, infection control colleagues, and bladder, bowel and continence specialists.
The document shares best practice for all aspects of catheter care in secondary, urgent and emergency care (UEC), community and primary care settings.
Urinary catheters are used by most medical and surgical specialties and are inserted and managed across all healthcare settings by a range of staff, including medics, nurses and healthcare support workers. However, catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs) and blood stream infections (BSIs) are leading causes of healthcare associated infections (HCAIs) in England.
The guidance brings together the expert knowledge and experience of the working group, alongside established pathways, checklists and best practice, including case studies from urology nurses and associated professions, with a focus on avoiding unnecessary catheters and reducing infections. The aim is help reduce the variation observed across the regions in England and ensure optimal patient care and outcomes.
For example, good communication is one of the essential components of best practice catheter care; the document encourages the use of catheter passports to facilitate better communication between patients, families, care partners, and the healthcare professionals caring for them. A key action in the delivery checklist for community care teams is to ensure patients have a catheter passport, detailing a management plan, self-management plan and a clear escalation process, if available and appropriate.
Ben Ayres, GIRFT’s joint clinical lead for urology, and Maria Oyston, head of nursing service delivery at NHS England, chaired the working group which developed the guidance.
“We know that urinary catheters can have a huge impact, both good and bad on a patient’s quality of life. We have also seen that catheter care is often disjointed across primary, emergency and secondary care. This guidance draws on the knowledge and experience of more than 40 colleagues in the working group to establish what good practice looks like – putting good communication, shared decision making and patient empowerment at the forefront of catheter care.”
