Revolutionary Vein-Viewing Technology Comes to Memorial

Memorial Medical Center—Lufkin is the first hospital in the Deep East Texas area to use the latest technology in vascular imaging, VeinViewer® Vision.  The patented VeinViewer is a revolutionary technology that projects the location of a patient’s subcutaneous vasculature directly on the surface of the skin, providing a vascular road map in real time.

“VeinViewer is truly having an impact on patient care,” said Mario Estrella, Vice President of Patient Services and Chief Nursing Officer of Memorial Health System of East Texas. “With VeinViewer, we have the potential to not only reduce the number of sticks, but also the levels of stress and discomfort associated with multiple sticks for our medical professionals, the patient and the patient’s family.”

VeinViewer provides medical professionals with, non-invasive technology for clinical treatments and procedures including, but not limited to, IV insertion, routine blood draws or sampling and PICC line insertion.  The VeinViewer enables medical professionals to see vasculature up to 10mm below the surface of the skin, projecting a visual roadmap to the patient’s vessels.

“VeinViewer makes our patients’ vein composition visible to the naked eye,” said Stacy Garcia, RN, Administrative Director of Critical Care Services at Memorial Health System of East Texas.  “With VeinViewer, we are experiencing success on even the most difficult patients. Instead of being stuck two, three or more times, with VeinViewer, they may be stuck only one time, with less pain.”

Developed by Christie Medical Holdings, VeinViewer is the first and only patented technology to locate deep, hard to find veins and project real-time images directly onto the surface of the skin. Vision is the third generation of VeinViewer and utilizes near-infrared light, a digital video camera and an image processing unit to build an image of the patient’s vasculature. The device then projects that image, in real time, onto the patient’s skin using visible light. Health care professionals can keep their hands free during procedures while the system accurately maps the patient’s vasculature regardless of age, body type or skin tone.  In 2004, VeinViewer was recognized by Time Magazine as one of the most amazing medical inventions.

Thanks to the generous donation of $15,835.00 from the Volunteer Auxiliary at Memorial Health System of East Texas the device is used throughout the hospital, wherever it is needed to serve patients.  “The Volunteers felt this technology is necessary for the local community.  Many patients are afraid of needles or experience discomfort.  Now patients such as children, the elderly and those with underlying health conditions that have hard to find veins should feel less anxiety and pain while the VeinViewer illuminates the veins,” stated Don Newland, President of the Memorial Volunteer Auxiliary.

“This technology has helped us increase the efficiency of our system and success rate of our needlesticks.  Anything we do to improve our efficiency and patient satisfaction reduces our expenses and allows us to reallocate our resources,” stated Estrella.