Impact of Blood Cultures Drawn From Arterial Lines on the Incidence of Contamination, Detection of Bacteremia, and Blood Culture Volume

NCT ID: NCT07183410

Last Updated: 2025-09-19

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: NOT_YET_RECRUITING
• Total Enrollment: 1500 participants
• Study Classification: OBSERVATIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2026-01-01
• Study Completion Date: 2028-06-01

Brief Summary

Taking blood cultures is an important and very common procedure in intensive care units due to the high incidence of sepsis and the need for rapid and accurate identification of bacteremia. However, despite the importance of taking a sufficient volume of blood for the purpose of identifying bacterial growth in the blood, the average blood volume in blood cultures at our institution ranges from 3.5-4 ml per bottle (where the desired volume is 10 ml). Taking an insufficient amount of blood reduces the ability of the bacteriological laboratory to detect bacterial growth and thus may lead to a delay or missed diagnosis of bacteremia, identification of the pathogen, and adjustment of appropriate treatment according to sensitivities.

In intensive care units, most patients are monitored using an arterial catheter, which allows for frequent blood tests without the need to puncture the patient. Following recently published studies that showed that there is no significant difference in the incidence of contamination when taking blood cultures from an arterial catheter compared to a peripheral vein puncture, and in order to improve our ability to identify bacteremia, it was decided to implement a new protocol in the General Intensive Care Unit that includes taking blood cultures from an arterial catheter. According to the new protocol, it was decided that when taking blood cultures from a patient with an arterial catheter, one pair of cultures should be taken from the arterial catheter and another pair from a peripheral vein puncture.

In this study, we would like to examine the contamination rate of blood cultures, the identification of true bacteremia, and the collection of appropriate blood volume and number of blood specimens taken in patients hospitalized in the General Intensive Care Unit at our institution, while analyzing differences between the period before the implementation of the new protocol and the period after the implementation, and differences between cultures taken from an arterial catheter and from a peripheral vein puncture.

Conditions

Bacteremia

Study Design

• Observational Model Type: CASE_CONTROL
• Study Time Perspective: PROSPECTIVE

Study Groups

Cultures from arterial line

From each patient enrolled in the study, two sets of blood cultures will be drawn: one set (2 bottles) from an arterial line and one set from peripheral venous puncture. Each patient will be both the study and the control group for himself: The comparison will be between the arterial line vs. the peripheral vein puncture set.

In addition, we will also perform a before and after intervention analysis- to examine whether the implementation of the new protocol improved the rate of appropriate blood culture volume and number of culture drawn from the patient .

Blood culture taken from an arterial catheter

Intervention Type: DIAGNOSTIC_TEST

Blood culture taken from an arterial catheter (instead of peripheral venous puncture)

Cultures from peripheral venous puncture

From each patient enrolled in the study, two sets of blood cultures will be drawn: one set (2 bottles) from an arterial line and one set from peripheral venous puncture. Each patient will be both the study and the control group for himself: The comparison will be between the arterial line vs. the peripheral vein puncture set.

In addition, we will also perform a before and after intervention analysis- to examine whether the implementation of the new protocol improved the rate of appropriate blood culture volume and number of culture drawn from the patient .

No interventions assigned to this group

Interventions

Blood culture taken from an arterial catheter

Blood culture taken from an arterial catheter (instead of peripheral venous puncture)

Intervention Type: DIAGNOSTIC_TEST

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

-

Exclusion Criteria

-

• Minimum Eligible Age: 18 Years
• Maximum Eligible Age: 99 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Sponsors

Meir Medical Center

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

sara dichtwald

Dr

Responsibility Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Locations

Meir Medical Center

Kfar Saba, , Israel

Countries

Israel

Other Identifiers

MMC-0234-25-

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id