Is it time for a culture change? Blood culture collection in the emergency department

Kerina J. Denny; Amy Sweeny; Julia Crilly; Samuel Maloney; Gerben Keijzers

doi:10.1111/1742-6723.13122

Is it time for a culture change? Blood culture collection in the emergency department

Kerina J. Denny^*, Amy Sweeny, Julia Crilly, Samuel Maloney, Gerben Keijzers

^*Corresponding author for this work

Faculty of Health Sciences & Medicine

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Research › peer-review

10 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Objective: To describe how frequently blood cultures (BCs) are obtained in the ED and to describe the incidence of true-and false-positive BC results.

Methods: Retrospective descriptive study of all patients presenting to a tertiary-level, mixed Australian ED over a 15 month period.

Results: A total of 3617 (3.67%) patients had BCs collected. Around one (12.1%) in eight of these BCs were positive; nearly half (45.2%) of which were identified as a false positive.

Conclusions: BCs are a common investigation in the ED with a high false-positive rate. Strategies are required to reduce false positives, including reducing inappropriate collection and improving collection techniques.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	575-577
Number of pages	3
Journal	EMA - Emergency Medicine Australasia
Volume	30
Issue number	4
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1111/1742-6723.13122
Publication status	Published - 1 Jan 2018

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abstract = "Objective: To describe how frequently blood cultures (BCs) are obtained in the ED and to describe the incidence of true-and false-positive BC results. Methods: Retrospective descriptive study of all patients presenting to a tertiary-level, mixed Australian ED over a 15 month period. Results: A total of 3617 (3.67%) patients had BCs collected. Around one (12.1%) in eight of these BCs were positive; nearly half (45.2%) of which were identified as a false positive. Conclusions: BCs are a common investigation in the ED with a high false-positive rate. Strategies are required to reduce false positives, including reducing inappropriate collection and improving collection techniques.",

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AU - Sweeny, Amy

AU - Crilly, Julia

AU - Maloney, Samuel

AU - Keijzers, Gerben

PY - 2018/1/1

Y1 - 2018/1/1

N2 - Objective: To describe how frequently blood cultures (BCs) are obtained in the ED and to describe the incidence of true-and false-positive BC results. Methods: Retrospective descriptive study of all patients presenting to a tertiary-level, mixed Australian ED over a 15 month period. Results: A total of 3617 (3.67%) patients had BCs collected. Around one (12.1%) in eight of these BCs were positive; nearly half (45.2%) of which were identified as a false positive. Conclusions: BCs are a common investigation in the ED with a high false-positive rate. Strategies are required to reduce false positives, including reducing inappropriate collection and improving collection techniques.

AB - Objective: To describe how frequently blood cultures (BCs) are obtained in the ED and to describe the incidence of true-and false-positive BC results. Methods: Retrospective descriptive study of all patients presenting to a tertiary-level, mixed Australian ED over a 15 month period. Results: A total of 3617 (3.67%) patients had BCs collected. Around one (12.1%) in eight of these BCs were positive; nearly half (45.2%) of which were identified as a false positive. Conclusions: BCs are a common investigation in the ED with a high false-positive rate. Strategies are required to reduce false positives, including reducing inappropriate collection and improving collection techniques.

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Is it time for a culture change? Blood culture collection in the emergency department

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