Comparative study of BacT/Alert FAN bottles and standard BacT/Alert bottles

A total of 5,230 paired blood cultures were sstudied. One sample was divided between aerobic and anaerobic BacT/Alert standard bottles, and the other divided between aerobic and anaerobic BacT/Alert FAN bottles. There mere 44 occasions where Staphylococcus aureus was I recovered only from the FAN bottles, compared to six where only the standard: bottles were positive (p < 0.001), and 21 occasions where Escherichia coli was isolated only from FAN bottles, compared to eight occasion where only the standard bottles were positive for this organism (p < 0.05). In 21 of 28 cases reviewed where S. aureus was isolated from FAN bottles only the patient had been receiving anti-staphylococcal antibiotics. However, only 2 of 30 cases where Gram-negative bacilli were isolated from FAN bottles had documented recent appropriate antibiotic therapy. Patients iii whom FAN bottles ave more likely to recover organisms cannot be selected on the basis of documented antibotic treatment. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Inc.