Catheters

Catheters

The human body continues with its metabolic activities round the clock. This metabolic process involves the drain of the waste material as well.  If there is any problem in this drainage system, the human body may have endless harms. This abnormality often occurs, when the patients, the victims of different diseases cease to urinate. Most of the time it happens in the diseases related to the kidneys. However, whatsoever the reason is, an immediate, though temporary resolution of the problem is often sought with the help of these catheters. A catheter is actually a suction tube, which can be inserted into the body of the patient, to ease the suppressed and stopped waste matter in his body. The process of inserting a catheter is catheterisation. In most of the cases, the catheter is a thin, flexible tube, while in few others, it is a larger, solid tube: a "hard" catheter. The hard catheters are used only in the cases; when the doctors believe that the soft catheters may fail to achieve the aim. Generally, it is believed that the catheters are used to drain the excess urine from a body. Actually the catheters are useful in various ailments and help in easing the various types of fluids, whose presence can harm the body. These are equally helpful for the people suffering from the severe stomach ailments, liver ailments, pancreas disorders or even the coronary diseases. Moreover, a few people, though safe from all the above problems, yet unable to urinate due to weakness or the post-surgical problems may also have to depend on these his useful apparatus. "Katheter" originally referred to an instrument that was inserted such as a plug. The history of the catheters dates back to the ancient Greek, where the people would insert a hollow metal tube through the urethra into the bladder of the patient to empty it and the tube then came to be known as a "katheter", which later on changed into the catheter. The ancient Egyptians also used the catheters, which were normally created from reeds.

The catheters have the multiple uses and very effectively reduce the burden of the patient in various ways. The Placement of a catheter into a particular part of the body may help in draining the urine from the urinary, drainage of urine from the kidney pelvis by percutaneous nephrostomy, or the drainage of fluid collections, e.g. as in an abdominal abscess etc. It also helps in the administration of intravenous fluids, medication or parenteral nutrition, angioplasty, angiography, balloon septostomy and balloon sinuplasty etc. It also helps in the direct measurement of blood pressure in an artery or vein, or the direct measurement of intra-cranial pressure. It assists the doctors in the administration of anesthetic medication into the epidural space, the subarachnoid space, or around a major nerve bundle such as the brachial plexus etc. It also facilitates in the subcutaneous administration of insulin or other medications, with the use of an infusion set and insulin pump. In short, a catheter is the wonderful device that eases the excess loads of the body, when the patient himself may not be able to do it.