Weil Institute associate director & team awarded grant to develop treatment strategy for central-line associated bloodstream infections (CLABSIs)
Treating CLABSIs frequently involves removing and replacing the central line, but a new strategy could mitigate the need for this risky process.
A research team led by Weil Institute Associate Director J. Scott VanEpps, MD, PhD, FACEP (Emergency Medicine), and co-investigators Michael Solomon, PhD (Chemical Engineering, Biointerfaces Institute), and Michael Heung, MD (Internal Medicine, Nephrology), has been awarded nearly $3 million from the NIH National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI). The funding will support the development of a novel treatment strategy for central line associated bloodstream infections (CLABSI).
A central line is a type of IV line inserted into a major vein to provide medication or fluids, or to collect blood for medical tests. The placement of a central line is necessary for various life-sustaining therapies such as dialysis, yet the process is not without its risks. Serious infections can occur if bacteria invade the patient’s bloodstream by way of the catheter.
Current strategies for managing CLABSIs frequently involve removing and replacing the catheter—an invasive process that can further complicate the catheter’s life-sustaining functions and introduce additional risks to the patient. Now, with the support of the NHLBI grant, Dr. VanEpps and the team seek to mitigate this process entirely.
“We are developing a strategy—‘HEATSAVE’— that will treat CLABSI in place using a combination of heat, antibiotics, and fluid flow, said Dr. VanEpps.
The aim of the HEATSAVE study is to optimize the treatment parameters for the application of heat and antibiotics for in situ CLABSI therapy in preparation for phase 1 human clinical trials. To achieve this, the team will: 1) Determine the dose and duration of heat therapy that maximizes efficacy and minimizes thermal injury in an animal model; 2) Define a geometry-independent description of the heat delivery required to allow translation from the animal to the human setting; and 3) Determine the relative the best method for delivery of antibiotics in combination with the heat therapy.
“Our ultimate goal is to obviate the need for invasive catheter replacement procedures,” said Dr. VanEpps.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), approximately 41,000 bloodstream infections strike hospital patients each year. If you include patients with catheters outside the walls of a hospital, this number is much greater. With HEATSAVE now in development, clinicians could soon have a new life-saving strategy in their arsenal against infections.