Advantage of combining resin with lytic BACTEC blood culture media

The BACTEC 9240 (Becton Dickinson, Sparks, Md.) automated blood culture system is based on the continuous monitoring of CO2 production by means of a fluorescent sensor attached to the bottom of a culture vial. We compared two media for this system, resin-containing Plus aerobic/F and Lytic anaerobic/F. Sets of Plus aerobic/F and Lytic anaerobic/F vials inoculated with similar volumes (9 +/- 2.5 ml) were evaluated. In the laboratory, the vials were introduced into the system in accordance with the recommendations of the manufacturer and incubated at 35 degrees C for 5 days. A total of 10,914 sets consisting of two bottles each were obtained from 3,674 patients (2.97 cultures per patient). Of these, 1,233 (11%) were culture positive, including 1,074 (10%) yielding at least one pathogen, and 178 (2%) were contaminated. A total of 1,135 isolates were considered clinically relevant in 624 septic episodes; we isolated 894 from Plus aerobic/F and 852 from Lytic anaerobic/F (P = 0.06 [not significant]). More S. aureus isolates (P = 0.05), Pseudomonas spp. (P < 0.0001), other gram-negative bacteria (P = 0.004), and yeasts (P < 0.0001) were isolated from Plus aerobic/F medium, but more streptococci (P < 0.0001), E. coli (P = 0.02) strains and anaerobes (P < 0.0001) were detected with Lytic anaerobic/F medium. Lytic anaerobic/F vials were significantly (P < 0.0001) more often positive at least 6 h before Plus aerobic/F vials (n = 112 versus 52, respectively). Significantly more (P < 0.0001) Plus aerobic/F vials (n = 210; 1.9%) than Lytic anaerobic/F vials (n = 42; 0.4%) were unconfirmed positives. Plus aerobic/F and Lytic anaerobic/F proved to be a valuable pair of blood culture media. Plus aerobic/F performs better for patients under antibiotic treatment, due to the antimicrobial-neutralizing effect of resins. For patients without antibiotic therapy, more microorganisms could be isolated from Lytic anaerobic/F due to cell lysis.