Introduction: Little is known about the bloodstream infection (BSI) risk associated with short-term peripheral venous catheters (PVCs) and no large study investigated the insertion site-related risk for PVC-BSI.

Methods: We performed a cohort study at the University of Geneva Hospitals using the prospective hospital-wide BSI surveillance database. We analyzed the association between insertion site and risk of PVC-BSI on the upper extremity using univariable and multivariable marginal Cox models.

Results: Between 2016 and 2020, utilization of 403'206 peripheral venous catheters were prospectively recorded in a 2000-bed hospital consortium with ten sites. Twenty-seven percent of PVC (n = 109'686) were inserted in the hand. After adjustment for confounding factors, hand insertion was associated with a decreased PVC-BSI risk (adjusted hazard ratio [HR] 0.42, 95% CI 0.18-0.98, p = 0.046) compared to more proximal insertion sites. In a sensitivity analysis for PVCs with = 3 days of dwell time, we confirmed a decreased PVC-BSI risk after hand insertion (HR 0.37, 95% CI 0.15-0.93, p = 0.035).

Conclusion: Hand insertion should be considered for reducing PVC infections, especially for catheters with an expected dwell time of more than 2 days.