Culture of body fluids using the bact/alert system

The BacT/Alert system was evaluated for its utility to recover clinically significant bacteria from several sterile body fluids, other than blood. Of the1500 specimens processed, 530 (35.33%) cultures were recorded positive by the BacT/Alert bottles while only 379 (25%) cultures were recovered on the plate cultures. The mean time to detection was < 12 hours for Gram-negative organisms and 12 - 16 hours for the Gram-positive organisms. The rapid detection of important pathogens like Streptococcus pneumoniae, Streptococcus pyogenes and Salmonella typhi, within 12 hours of inoculation, is of particular interest especially in serious infections like deep-seated abscesses. This enabled the treating physician to start the specific and appropriate antibiotics early and facilitated a better prognosis in the patient. The system is also very efficient in the early detection of anaerobes from the clinical specimens.