Doing it right the first time: quality improvement and the contaminant blood culture

Weinbaum, Fredric I.; Lavie, Sol; Danek, Margaret; Sixsmith, Diane M; Heinrich, George; Mills, Stephen S.

doi:10.1128/jcm.35.3.563-565.1997

Cited by 119 publications

(45 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…Only limited data are available concerning the association between the expertise of staff members and the risk of BCC. Previous studies have shown that trained phlebotomists are associated with lower BCC rates than resident physicians [4,15,16]. In the present study, the gender and status of personnel were not associated independently with BCC, and younger physicians performed no worse than those with more experience.…”

Section: Introductioncontrasting

confidence: 60%

Reduction of blood culture contamination rate by an educational intervention

Eskira

Gilad

Schlaeffer

et al. 2006

Clinical Microbiology and Infection

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The efficacy of an educational intervention to prevent blood culture contamination (BCC) in internal medicine was studied in two medical wards in a busy tertiary-care hospital in which blood cultures were obtained by physicians rather than dedicated phlebotomists. Baseline BCC rates were 5.7% and 7.1% in intervention and control wards, respectively (p 0.6), compared with 1.95% and 6.7%, respectively, post-intervention (p < 0.001). Following multivariate analysis, only an absence of intervention was an independent variable associated with BCC. Thus simple educational intervention reduced BCC in internal medicine and was considered to be cost-effective.

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Section: Introductioncontrasting

confidence: 60%

Reduction of blood culture contamination rate by an educational intervention

Eskira

Gilad

Schlaeffer

et al. 2006

Clinical Microbiology and Infection

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“…Several studies have suggested methods to reduce blood culture contamination, 7 including standardization of collec-impact of contaminated blood cultures 3 tion technique and utilization of blood culture sample collection teams. 6,[8][9][10] Our study suggests that substantial unnecessary interventions and possible adverse outcomes can be attributed to blood culture contamination. Implementation of known mechanisms to reduce blood culture contamination more broadly and investigation of further techniques for contamination reduction can, hopefully, prevent such events.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Clinical Impact of Blood Cultures Contaminated with Coagulase-Negative Staphylococci at an Academic Medical Center

Heijden

Miller

Wright

et al. 2011

Infect. Control Hosp. Epidemiol.

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Of all blood cultures positive for coagulase-negative staphylococci collected in 1 year at an academic hospital, 100 were selected randomly for review and designated true positives or contaminated. For the 85 patients whose cultures were determined to be contaminated, chart abstractions revealed substantial unnecessary antibiotic administration, additional laboratory tests and procedures, and hospital readmissions.

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“…The contamination rates of blood cultures collected by phlebotomists were significantly lower than the rates for blood cultures obtained by nonphlebotomists in the emergency department (3.1% vs. 7.4%) [4]. Introduction of a dedicated blood culture team significantly reduced the blood culture contamination rate in the other studies [5,18,19].…”

Section: Frequency Of Staphylococcus Aureus Klebsiella Pneumoniae Ormentioning

confidence: 93%

Compliance with Blood Volumes Collected for Blood Cultures between Physicians and Phlebotomists

et al. 2013

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Background: Blood culture is essential for the diagnosis and management of bloodstream infections. Blood volume is a key parameter determining the success of blood cultures. Studies comparing compliance between physicians and phlebotomists regarding optimal blood culture procedure are very rare in Korea. Methods: After educating physicians (interns) and phlebotomists about the correct procedure for blood culturing, the blood volumes of forty-three percent of randomly selected aerobic and anaerobic culture sets for adult patients (≥18 years old) were compared between these two groups over a period of three months. Physicians obtained blood from all admitted patients except those in the emergency department, where phlebotomists performed blood collection. Results: The numbers of blood culture sets requested during the study period were 3,238 and 2,136 for the physician and phlebotomist groups, respectively. The blood volumes of blood culture sets were significantly higher for the phlebotomists (16.7 mL) than for the physicians (9.2 mL). The positive rate of blood culture was also higher for the phlebotomist group (10.3% vs. 7.9%). The contamination rates (0.8%) were the same for both groups. Conclusion: Although the patients' medical conditions, antibiotics prescriptions, or duration of hospitalization may have affected the positive rate of blood cultures, this rate might also have been influenced by the blood volume. The compliance of phlebotomists was greater than that of physicians regarding the blood volume collected for blood cultures. (Ann Clin Microbiol 2013;16:81-86)

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Doing it right the first time: quality improvement and the contaminant blood culture

Cited by 119 publications

References 9 publications

Reduction of blood culture contamination rate by an educational intervention

Reduction of blood culture contamination rate by an educational intervention

Clinical Impact of Blood Cultures Contaminated with Coagulase-Negative Staphylococci at an Academic Medical Center

Compliance with Blood Volumes Collected for Blood Cultures between Physicians and Phlebotomists

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