Two Blood Cultures With Age-Appropriate Volume Enhance Suspected Sepsis Decision-Making

Multiple blood cultures have been shown to improve pathogen yield and antimicrobial stewardship for adult patients with suspected serious bacterial infection (SBI). For children, the use of multiple blood cultures is less common and volume recommendations are more complicated, often resulting in single cultures with low volume.

In 2010, Children's Hospital Colorado instituted electronic medical record (EMR) decision support to recommend collection of 2 blood cultures before administration of antibiotics for suspected SBI. Recommended blood culture volumes were calculated by age rather than weight. We evaluated all children admitted to inpatient units between 2008 and 2009 (pre-intervention) and 2011 and 2013 (postintervention) who received antibiotics in the hospital after having blood cultures drawn in the emergency department, excluding those with a length of stay >8 days. We compared blood culture yield, isolate classification (pathogen vs contaminant), and antimicrobial modifications before and after the interventions.

A total of 3948 children were included in the study. EMR guidelines were associated with a significantly higher number of children with multiple blood cultures drawn before antibiotic administration (88.0% vs 12.3%; P < .001) and an increased percentage of blood cultures with the recommended volume (74.3% vs 15.2%; P < .001), resulting in a significantly higher pathogen isolation rate and improved antimicrobial decisions. Multiple cultures helped define the role of common contaminants in the clinical decision process.

Multiple blood cultures with age-based volumes taken before starting antibiotics increase pathogen isolation rates and appropriate modification of antimicrobial treatment in children.