With most nurses taking care of many patients with similar needs, Spencer Jones (a nurse) found that one repeated problem that was dangerous to patients was the failure of IVs due to dislodgment. There are many ways to dislodge IVs and catheters, but there isn’t an easy way of preventing the problem. He took inspiration from gas pumps that have a device that works to prevent similar problems at the pumps. Using this idea, he developed a new piece of technology he called the SafeBreak Vascular system, which was approved in May 2022. Jones has set up a new company called Lineus Medical and moved out of nursing and into sales to get his product on the market, especially now that it’s been approved. He gets to talk about new technology and see other nurses react to his device and provide some feedback. He also discussed how they can often tell that the device was dreamed up by a nurse because of how specific it is to what they do. Moving forward, he would like to see similar thinking to further progress the field in positive ways that both eases the work of nurses and improves the experiences of patients.
If you want to learn more about the experiences of the nurse and the patent process, you can read the full article at Nursing Alumnus Invents Medical Device to Prevent IV Dislodgement.
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