TY - JOUR
T1 - Perform or perish
T2 - Laboratory optimization to avoid false negative blood cultures in pneumococcal bacteremia
AU - Eshwara, Vandana Kalwaje
AU - Shaw, Tushar
AU - Mukim, Yasha
AU - Kumar, Gauri
AU - Kamath, Asha
AU - Mukhopadhyay, Chiranjay
PY - 2019/8/1
Y1 - 2019/8/1
N2 - We present the laboratory operations influencing the culture yield of pneumococci and suggest an alternate solution to the problem. Blood cultures of 136 adults and 19 pediatric patients were analyzed in two phases. In phase I, the laboratory operated only during weekdays but in phase II the laboratory provided 24-h services on all days. In phase I, successful bacterial isolation leading to testing of antimicrobial susceptibility was possible only in 51% of cases, while a significant 49% had failed to grow in subcultures due to autolysis resulting from delayed processing time. These false negative blood cultures were further confirmed as Streptococcus pneumoniae by commercial antigen tests. In phase II, we did not observe any false-negative results due to prompt subculturing protocols (p < 0.001). We also found that taking blood cultures on two occasions increases the yield by 46% among adults.
AB - We present the laboratory operations influencing the culture yield of pneumococci and suggest an alternate solution to the problem. Blood cultures of 136 adults and 19 pediatric patients were analyzed in two phases. In phase I, the laboratory operated only during weekdays but in phase II the laboratory provided 24-h services on all days. In phase I, successful bacterial isolation leading to testing of antimicrobial susceptibility was possible only in 51% of cases, while a significant 49% had failed to grow in subcultures due to autolysis resulting from delayed processing time. These false negative blood cultures were further confirmed as Streptococcus pneumoniae by commercial antigen tests. In phase II, we did not observe any false-negative results due to prompt subculturing protocols (p < 0.001). We also found that taking blood cultures on two occasions increases the yield by 46% among adults.
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U2 - 10.1515/labmed-2018-0172
DO - 10.1515/labmed-2018-0172
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85069666705
SN - 2567-9430
VL - 43
SP - 217
EP - 220
JO - Journal of Laboratory Medicine
JF - Journal of Laboratory Medicine
IS - 4
ER -