Nurse empowers cancer patients, saves trips to hospital

When a patient got to spend more time gardening and tending to her chickens, and not on the patchwork of southern Colorado highways and country lanes leading to UCHealth Memorial Hospital Central, Casey Peat celebrated.

Peat, an oncology manager at the hospital, is giving patients more time doing the things they love. Instead of driving long distances to Memorial Hospital Central, Memorial Hospital North or Pikes Peak Regional Hospital in Woodland Park, patients who show interest and ability can remove their chemotherapy infusion pumps at home.

“I wanted to help our patients be more independent,” Peat said. “And to offer some control over this thing we often can’t control called cancer.”

After learning of a similar process at UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital, Peat and other Memorial nurses designed a nurse-driven protocol that gauged a patient’s interest and ability to remove their own pump and lines following a 46-hour home chemotherapy treatment. The home treatment often follows five-hour inpatient chemotherapy infusions.

Peat created the protocol and patient education materials including fliers, a video and a phone-a-nurse friend option.  Like a door-to-door salesperson, the eight-year nurse and mother of two young children, pitched her idea and sought approval of various departments including oncology, medical directors, pharmacy and nursing leadership.  Each offered suggestions. The process took months of careful planning to ensure patient safety.

By removing the pump at home, patients avoid a trip to a hospital. But it’s not for everyone. Peat recounted a patient who lives close to Memorial Hospital Central who prefers to have her pump removed by nursing staff. Others relish the idea of not having to ask friends or family members to devote a day driving them to the hospital for a 10-minute procedure.

“I wanted to give our patients freedom,” Peat said. “That kept me moving.”

The first patient to take advantage of the new process lives on a ranch more than 2.5 hours from Memorial Hospital Central. Previous trips required calling in favors from friends or family members, asking them to devote most of a day as well as ignoring weather forecasts and traveling narrow roads where deer and cattle collisions commonly occur. With encouragement from her husband, she was able to complete the procedure at her rural home without incident. That left more time with her garden, chickens and mountain view.

“If I can give someone five hours back in their life, I’ve been successful,” Peat said. “We’re here to support our patients in any way we can.”