About the Pan London Critical Care IV Therapy passport programme

This programme has been developed to deliver standardised teaching and assessment on the administration of IV medication in Intensive Care. It will reduce variation in teaching and reduce the need to repeat training for nurses and other healthcare practitioners (HCP). It is aimed at new starters in Intensive Care who are already qualified to give IV medication outside Intensive Care.

When all sections are completed, the passport indicates that the holder is competent to safely administer IV medication (as assessed) in Intensive Care areas. It is not exhaustive, and covers basic safety principles for some commonly used drugs. Specifically, it does not cover blood products, total parenteral nutrition, epidurals and patient controlled analgesia or anticoagulation for extracorporeal circuits.

If passport holders move to a new area there will be no requirement to repeat the entire learning and assessment process. There is still a requirement to review practice in a new area with an educator / manager to assess whether any additional learning or assessment is needed before giving IV medication in that area.

Who it’s aimed at

All London-based nurses and HCPs delivering care and IV medications to critically ill and injured patients.

Staff elsewhere in the country should consult their local critical care policies or education team to ensure this elearning package is recognised within local arrangements.

Prerequisites

Staff need to hold a valid hospital IV medication competency prior to accessing the Critical Care IV Therapy Programme. They must also be competent to use all necessary administration devices and must have demonstrated competency in a medication  calculations test as specified by their unit.

The Critical Care IV Therapy Passport pathway

The pathway to the CCIV passport is comprised of three steps as illustrated below:

Step 1 Access elearning

Access the Critical IV Therapy Passport elearning programme on the elfh Hub. The elearning programme is free to access for health care professionals working within NHS organisations, charities, social care and Higher Education Institutions (HEI), and is accessible for other organisations by arrangement.

elearning content

There are six knowledge sessions:

• Intravenous Vasoactive Medication
• Sedatives, Analgesia and Paralysing Agents
• Electrolytes
• Antiarrhythmic Medication – Amiodarone
• Other Important IV Medications
• Communication and Human Factors

Step 2 Assess Knowledge

Assessment of knowledge is via eAssessment on the elfh Hub.

All elearning sessions must be completed, and the eAssessment passed, before learners can undertake their practice assessment.

Step 3 Practice Learning and Assessment

There are two parts to Step 3:

Part 1: Completion of the Medication Administration section of the CC3N National Step 1 competency.

Part 2: Passing the Pan-London Critical Care IV therapy practice assessment. This can either be the paper version (which can be downloaded from CCIV PLAD), or the digital version on HEE’s digital learning system. The digital version is being rolled out across London from autumn 2022, for more information on this please email capitalnurse@hee.nhs.uk

The practice assessment includes mandatory and optional proficiencies. The learner’s educator / manager will specify which optional proficiencies the learner should complete. They are optional for the unit, not the learner.

More information

Development and support for this work

Work to develop a Pan London Critical Care IV Passport started with the North West London Critical Care Network Clinical Applied Skills Passport (CLASP) project in 2016. The ambition was to collectively reduce:

• Unwarranted variation in standards
• Duplication of effort and resource utilisation
• Clinical time assessing theoretical competence packages
• Standardise skills training and competency sign off for staff looking after critically ill patients across all sites in north west London and across the capital

A Pan London education group was established to review all critical care IV competence documents across Trusts in London and develop one competency for critical care IV for London. This was successfully piloted in nine critical care units across London. The project involved critical care nurse educators in London-based Trusts and many stakeholders including (not exhaustive) directors of nursing, governance leads, critical care matrons, pharmacists, lead nurses and medical leads have contributed to the development. In order to assist and accelerate delivery of CLASP right across London, the critical care IV competency has been included in the CapitalNurse work Programme.

Special thanks goes to the following individuals:

• Peachiammal Subramanian, Practice Development Sister, Barts Health NHS Trust
• Christiana Udoh, Critical Care Practice Development Nurse, King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
• Elaine Manderson, Matron – Intensive Care, Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
• Maryke Woest, Clinical Nurse Educator, Adult Intensive Care Unit, Bupa Cromwell Hospital
• Claire Wroe, Clinical Practice Educator, Adult Intensive Care Unit, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust
• PanLondon Critical Care Nurse Education Group

How to access

In order to access the Critical Care Intravenous Therapy programme, you will need an elfh account. If you do not have one, then you can register by selecting the Register button below.

Register >

To view the Critical Care Intravenous Therapy programme, select the View button below. If you already have an account with elfh, you will also be able to login and enrol on the programme from the View button.

View >

Not an NHS organisation?

If you are not an NHS health or care organisation and therefore do not qualify for free access elfh Hub, you may be able to access the service by creating an OpenAthens account.

To check whether or not you qualify for free access via OpenAthens, you can view the eligibility criteria and register on the ‘OpenAthens’ portal.

Registering large numbers of users

If you are a HR, IT or Practice Manager and would like to register and enrol large numbers of staff within your organisation for access onto the Critical Care Intravenous Therapy programme, please contact elfh directly.

Organisations wishing to use their own LMS

For HR departments wanting to know more about gaining access to courses using an existing Learning Management System please contact elfh directly to express interest.

More information

Please select the following link for more information on how to use the elfh Hub.