The era of home urine cultures

The parents of 289 children performed bacteriuria screening with a self-administered dip-strip culture, which was inoculated, incubated and interpreted in the home. Simultaneous pour-plate quantitative cultures and laboratory tested dip-strip cultures were done on the same urine specimen that had been tested at home. The dip-strip culture was reliable (89 percent) in detecting significant bacteriuria with home administration and interpretation. Only 1.6 percent falsely positive results occurred in the home testing. The dip-strip home cultures are an effective way to screen or followup patients with bacteriuria.