These tools will no longer be maintained as of December 31, 2024. Archived website can be found here. PubMed4Hh GitHub repository can be found here. Contact NLM Customer Service if you have questions.


Pubmed for Handhelds

PUBMED FOR HANDHELDS

Search MEDLINE/PubMed

  • Title: Phlebotomy teams reduce blood-culture contamination rate and save money.
    Author: Surdulescu S, Utamsingh D, Shekar R.
    Journal: Clin Perform Qual Health Care; 1998; 6(2):60-2. PubMed ID: 10180122.
    Abstract:
    OBJECTIVE: To determine the extent of resource utilization due to contaminated blood cultures. DESIGN: Case-control retrospective analysis. Twenty-three patients who had contaminated blood cultures were matched by age, underlying diseases, and discharge diagnoses with 23 patients who had negative blood cultures. SETTING: St Luke's Medical Center, a community teaching hospital in Cleveland, Ohio. The phlebotomy team was eliminated in November 1993 to reduce the costs. RESULTS: Blood cultures drawn by the phlebotomy team had a lower contamination rate compared with those drawn by nonphlebotomists (2.6% vs 5.6%). Patients with contaminated blood cultures were compared to those with negative blood cultures. The following parameters were found to be statistically significant: total hospital length of stay (LOS; 13.9 vs 5.5 days; P = .002), postculture LOS (8.9 vs 4.6; P = .01), postculture number of days on antibiotics (5.9 vs 2.9; P = .03), vancomycin use (9 vs 2 patients; P = .03), postculture cost of antibiotics ($762 vs $121; P = .004), and postculture hospital cost per patient ($10,515 vs $4,213; P = .001). CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrated a substantial increase in resource utilization in our hospital due to contaminated blood cultures. The reinstitution of a phlebotomy team could be a cost-effective solution with savings between $950,000 and $1.5 million per year for our hospital.
    [Abstract] [Full Text] [Related] [New Search]