For two years, Chris Jungkans, BSN, RN, CPUI, VA-BC™, dodged his coworker’s urges to take his skills in the outpatient infusion department a step further: learning peripherally inserted central catheters. When he finally agreed—more for his coworker’s sake than his own—he did not expect much to come from it.
Now, he has successfully created and maintained his institution’s vascular access team from the ground up.
Leading the charge for change
The idea to lead the charge on creating the team took hold of Jungkans after he found that he was skilled with PICCs. And better yet, he really enjoyed this skill.
His excitement turned to a passion as he dove into the deep end of the vascular access pool, looking for more knowledge and gaining his VA-BC™.
“Through certification, I began reading periodicals and articles related to vascular access. I happened to stumble upon one that talked about organizational benefits associated with creation of a vascular access team,” Jungkans said. “The lightbulb went [on] in my head.”
After six months of research and a 30-page business proposal, he and his coworkers proposed the new team to leadership. To his surprise, they approved a three-month trial run by the end of the meeting.
Building and reaping the benefits of this specialty team
Jungkans got to work immediately. And he had plenty of work to do.
“Early in the process, as word got out that we had a vascular access team, we started to be overwhelmed with ultrasound IV requests,” he said. This made it more difficult to help patients with more urgent requests, like PICCs and midlines, or central line dressing changes.
Still, it was a welcome struggle to have. The team was in high demand and doing their jobs well, according to the research from the trial period.
Three years later, the success of the team has only grown, according to Jungkans.
“Our team has greatly reduced device complications, and the hospital’s spending a lot less money on material supplies,” he said. “The patient experience scores are higher with the insertion process.”
“Our team has greatly reduced device complications, and the hospital’s spending a lot less money on material supplies…The patient experience scores are higher with the insertion process.”
The team reduced delays in care, wasted material costs, and patient pain as they intended, but it has soared past Jungkans’s early expectations in several ways. For one, the team has expanded to become a mobile vascular access team with a sister hospital nearby. The staff of the team has also been able to educate other clinicians, from new graduates to physicians, about line insertion and assessment to cut down on complications, too.
Jungkans noted that the VA-BC™ credential— something he hopes the whole team will add to their names by the end of the year—has helped strengthen the team’s relationship with physicians when looking for recommendations on a patient’s care.
“Oftentimes, they come to us and say, ‘What do you think? How is this patient going to be best served?’”
Jungkans: 2022 Nurse of the Year
And yet, his work in creating, maintaining and expanding the vascular access team is not what cinched Jungkans’s 2022 Nurse of the Year award for his institution.
What inspired his nomination and cemented his reception of the award was his work on four shared governance councils. He advocates for bedside clinicians and connects their suggestions with leadership to inform decision making. With his work on the Nursing Professional Development Council, Jungkans tripled the hospital rates of newly certified nurses in 2023 compared to the previous year.
Even with his clear team-player attitude, he was surprised at his award win.
“You don’t expect it to be you,” he said. “I felt completely blindsided and very blessed, grateful and surprised. And honored—can’t forget the word honored.”
The vascular access team hopes to start a central venous catheter insertion program. With the hospital’s physicians on board and a research proposal already crafted—clocking in around 12 pages, true to Jungkans’s fashion—Jungkans feels ready for the new challenge.
