To understand healthcare workers’ (HCWs) beliefs and practices toward blood culture (BCx) use.

Cross-sectional electronic survey and semi-structured interviews.

Academic hospitals in the United States.

HCWs involved in BCx ordering and collection in adult intensive care units (ICU) and wards.

We administered an anonymous electronic survey to HCWs and conducted semi-structured interviews with unit staff and quality improvement (QI) leaders in these institutions to understand their perspectives regarding BCx stewardship between February and November 2023.

Of 314 HCWs who responded to the survey, most (67.4%) were physicians and were involved in BCx ordering (82.3%). Most survey respondents reported that clinicians had a low threshold to culture patients for fever (84.4%) and agreed they could safely reduce the number of BCx obtained in their units (65%). However, only half of them believed BCx was overused. Although most made BCx decisions as a team (74.1%), a minority reported these team discussions occurred daily (42.4%). A third of respondents reported not usually collecting the correct volume per BCx bottle, half were unaware of the improved sensitivity of 2 BCx sets, and most were unsure of the nationally recommended BCx contamination threshold (87.5%). Knowledge regarding the utility of BCx for common infections was limited.

HCWs’ understanding of best collection practices and yield of BCx was limited.

Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacterales (CRE) are an urgent threat to healthcare, but the epidemiology of these antimicrobial-resistant organisms may be evolving in some settings since the COVID-19 pandemic. An updated analysis of hospital-acquired CRE (HA-CRE) incidence in community hospitals is needed.

We retrospectively analyzed data on HA-CRE cases and antimicrobial utilization (AU) from two community hospital networks, the Duke Infection Control Outreach Network (DICON) and the Duke Antimicrobial Stewardship Outreach Network (DASON) from January 2013 to June 2023. The zero-inflated negative binomial regression model was used owing to excess zeros.

126 HA-CRE cases from 36 hospitals were included in the longitudinal analysis. The pooled incidence of HA CRE was 0.69 per 100,000 patient days (95% confidence interval [95% CI], 0.57–0.82 HA-CRE rate significantly decreased over time before COVID-19 (rate ratio [RR], 0.94 [95% CI, 0.89–0.99]; p = 0.02), but there was a significant slope change indicating a trend increase in HA-CRE after COVID-19 (RR, 1.32 [95% CI, 1.06–1.66]; p = 0.01). In 21 hospitals participating in both DICON and DASON from January 2018 to June 2023, there was a correlation between HA-CRE rates and AU for CRE treatment (Spearman’s coefficient = 0.176; p < 0.01). Anti-CRE AU did not change over time, and there was no level or slope change after COVID.

The incidence of HA-CRE decreased before COVID-19 in a network of community hospitals in the southeastern United States, but this trend was disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

We aimed to determine whether automated identification of antibiotic targeting suspected urinary tract infection (UTI) shortened the time to antimicrobial stewardship (AS) intervention.

Retrospective before-and-after study.

Tertiary and quaternary care academic medical center.

Emergency department (ED) or admitted adult patients meeting best practice alert (BPA) criteria during pre- and post-BPA periods.

We developed a BPA to alert AS pharmacists of potential ASB triggered by the following criteria: ED or admitted status, antibiotic order with genitourinary indication, and a preceding urinalysis with ≤ 10 WBC/hpf. We evaluated the median time from antibiotic order to AS intervention and overall percent of UTI-related interventions among patients in pre-BPA (01/2020–12/2020) and post-BPA (04/15/2021–04/30/2022) periods.

774 antibiotic orders met inclusion criteria: 355 in the pre- and 419 in the post-BPA group. 43 (35 UTI-related) pre-BPA and 117 (94 UTI-related) post-BPA interventions were documented. The median time to intervention was 28 hours (IQR 18–65) in the pre-BPA group compared to 16 hours (IQR 2–34) in the post-BPA group (P < 0.01). Despite absent pyuria, there were six cases with gram-negative bacteremia presumably from a urinary source.

Automated identification of antibiotics targeting UTI without pyuria on urinalysis reduced the time to stewardship intervention and increased the rate of UTI-specific interventions. Clinical decision support aided in the efficiency of AS review and syndrome-targeted impact, but cases still required AS clinical review.

To determine whether removal of default duration, embedded in electronic prescription (e-script), influenced antibiotic days of therapy.

Interrupted time-series analysis.

The study was conducted across 2 community hospitals, 1 academic hospital, 3 emergency departments, and 86 ambulatory clinics.

Adults prescribed a fluoroquinolone with a duration <31 days.

Removal of standard 10-day fluoroquinolone default duration and addition of literature-based duration guidance in the order entry on December 19, 2017. The study period included data for 12 months before and after the intervention.

The study included 35,609 fluoroquinolone e-scripts from the preintervention period and 31,303 fluoroquinolone e-scripts from the postintervention period, accounting for 520,388 cumulative fluoroquinolone DOT. Mean durations before and after the intervention were 7.8 (SD, 4.3) and 7.7 (SD, 4.5), a nonsignificant change. E-scripts with a 10-day duration decreased prior to and after the default removal. The inpatient setting showed a significant 8% drop in 10-day e-scripts after default removal and a reduced median duration by 1 day; 10-day scripts declined nonsignificantly in ED and ambulatory settings. In the ambulatory settings, both 7- and 14-day e-script durations increased after default removal.

Removal of default 10-day antibiotic durations did not affect overall mean duration but did shift patterns in prescribing, depending on practice setting. Stewardship interventions must be studied in the context of practice setting. Ambulatory stewardship efforts separate from inpatient programs are needed because interventions cannot be assumed to have similar effects.

To analyze Clostridioides difficile testing in 3 hospitals in central North Carolina to validate previous racial health-disparity findings.

We completed a retrospective analysis of inpatient C. difficile tests from 2015 to 2021 at 3 university-affiliated hospitals in North Carolina. We calculated the number of C. difficile tests per 1,000 patient days stratified by race: White, Black, and non-White, non-Black (NWNB). We defined a unique C. difficile test as one that occurred in an inpatient unit with a matching laboratory accession ID and on differing calendar days. Tests were evaluated overall, by hospital, by year, and by positivity rate.

In total, 35,160 C. difficile tests and 2,571,850 patient days across all 3 hospitals from 2015 to 2021 were analyzed. The median number of C. difficile tests per 1,000 patient days was 13.85 (interquartile range [IQR], 9.88–16.07). Among all C. difficile tests, 5,225 (15%) were positive. White patients were administered more C. difficile tests (14.46 per 1,000 patient days) than Black patients (12.96; P < .0001) or NWNB race patients (10.27; P < .0001). Black patients were administered more tests than NWNB patients (P < .0001). White patients tested positive at a similar rate to Black patients (15% vs 15%; P = .3655) and higher than NWNB individuals (12%; P = .0061), and Black patients tested positive at a higher rate than NWNB patients (P = .0024).

White patients received more C. difficile tests than Black and NWNB patient groups when controlling for race patient days. Future studies should control for comorbidities and investigate community onset of C. difficile by race and ethnicity.

Urine cultures collected from catheterized patients have a high likelihood of false-positive results due to colonization. We examined the impact of a clinical decision support (CDS) tool that includes catheter information on test utilization and patient-level outcomes.

This before-and-after intervention study was conducted at 3 hospitals in North Carolina. In March 2021, a CDS tool was incorporated into urine-culture order entry in the electronic health record, providing education about indications for culture and suggesting catheter removal or exchange prior to specimen collection for catheters present >7 days. We used an interrupted time-series analysis with Poisson regression to evaluate the impact of CDS implementation on utilization of urinalyses and urine cultures, antibiotic use, and other outcomes during the pre- and postintervention periods.

The CDS tool was prompted in 38,361 instances of urine cultures ordered in all patients, including 2,133 catheterized patients during the postintervention study period. There was significant decrease in urine culture orders (1.4% decrease per month; P < .001) and antibiotic use for UTI indications (2.3% decrease per month; P = .006), but there was no significant decline in CAUTI rates in the postintervention period. Clinicians opted for urinary catheter removal in 183 (8.5%) instances. Evaluation of the safety reporting system revealed no apparent increase in safety events related to catheter removal or reinsertion.

CDS tools can aid in optimizing urine culture collection practices and can serve as a reminder for removal or exchange of long-term indwelling urinary catheters at the time of urine-culture collection.

Clinicians and laboratories routinely use urinalysis (UA) parameters to determine whether antimicrobial treatment and/or urine cultures are needed. Yet the performance of individual UA parameters and common thresholds for action are not well defined and may vary across different patient populations.

In this retrospective cohort study, we included all encounters with UAs ordered 24 hours prior to a urine culture between 2015 and 2020 at 3 North Carolina hospitals. We evaluated the performance of relevant UA parameters as potential outcome predictors, including sensitivity, specificity, negative predictive value (NPV), and positive predictive value (PPV). We also combined 18 different UA criteria and used receiver operating curves to identify the 5 best-performing models for predicting significant bacteriuria (≥100,000 colony-forming units of bacteria/mL).

In 221,933 encounters during the 6-year study period, no single UA parameter had both high sensitivity and high specificity in predicting bacteriuria. Absence of leukocyte esterase and pyuria had a high NPV for significant bacteriuria. Combined UA parameters did not perform better than pyuria alone with regard to NPV. The high NPV ≥0.90 of pyuria was maintained among most patient subgroups except females aged ≥65 years and patients with indwelling catheters.

When used as a part of a diagnostic workup, UA parameters should be leveraged for their NPV instead of sensitivity. Because many laboratories and hospitals use reflex urine culture algorithms, their workflow should include clinical decision support and or education to target symptomatic patients and focus on populations where absence of pyuria has high NPV.

To evaluate the pattern of blood-culture utilization among a cohort of 6 hospitals to identify potential opportunities for diagnostic stewardship.

We completed a retrospective analysis of blood-culture utilization during adult inpatient or emergency department (ED) encounters in 6 hospitals from May 2019 to April 2020. We investigated 2 measures of blood-culture utilization rates (BCURs): the total number of blood cultures, defined as a unique accession number per 1,000 patient days (BCX) and a new metric of blood-culture events per 1,000 patient days to account for paired culture practices. We defined a blood-culture event as an initial blood culture and all subsequent samples for culture drawn within 12 hours for patients with an inpatient or ED encounter. Cultures were evaluated by unit type, positivity and contamination rates, and other markers evaluating the quality of blood-culture collection.

In total, 111,520 blood cultures, 52,550 blood culture events, 165,456 inpatient admissions, and 568,928 patient days were analyzed. Overall, the mean BCUR was 196 blood cultures per 1,000 patient days, with 92 blood culture events per 1,000 patient days (range, 64–155 among hospitals). Furthermore, 7% of blood-culture events were single culture events, 55% began in the ED, and 77% occurred in the first 3 hospital days. Among all blood cultures, 7.7% grew a likely pathogen, 2.1% were contaminated, and 5.9% of first blood cultures were collected after the initiation of antibiotics.

Blood-culture utilization varied by hospital and was heavily influenced by ED culture volumes. Hospital comparisons of blood-culture metrics can assist in identifying opportunities to optimize blood-culture collection practices.

The typical 5-day work week affects healthcare outcomes. Structured work hours have also been implicated in antimicrobial prescribing choice. We developed a visualization tool to aid in evaluating breadth of antibiotic use in various time (day of week and hour of day) and space (patient location) combinations.

We evaluated antibiotic administration data from a tertiary-care academic medical center between July 1, 2018, and July 1, 2020. We calculated a cumulative empiric antibiotic spectrum score by adapting a previously validated antibiotic spectrum index (ASI) and applying that score to empiric antibiotic use. We visualized these data as a heat map based on various day-of-week–time combinations and then compared the distribution of scores between weekday nights, weekend days, and weekend nights to the typical workweek hours (weekday days, weekday days) using the Mann-Whitney U nonparametric test with a Bonferroni correction.

The analysis included 76,535 antibiotic starts across 53,900 unique patient admissions over 2 years. The mean cumulative ASI was higher in all 3 night and weekend combinations (weekday nights, 7.3; weekend days, 7.6; weekend nights, 7.5) compared to the weekday daytime hours (weekday days, 7.1) and the distribution of scores was different in all groups compared to the weekday daytime reference. The cumulative ASI was also higher in intensive care units.

Empiric antibiotic prescribing patterns differed across space and time; broader antibiotic choices occurred in the intensive care units and on nights and weekends. Visualization of these patterns aids in antimicrobial prescribing pattern recognition and may assist in finding opportunities for additional antimicrobial stewardship interventions.

Early administration of antibiotics in sepsis is associated with improved patient outcomes, but safe and generalizable approaches to de-escalate or discontinue antibiotics after suspected sepsis events are unknown.

We used a modified Delphi approach to identify safety criteria for an opt-out protocol to guide de-escalation or discontinuation of antibiotic therapy after 72 hours in non-ICU patients with suspected sepsis. An expert panel with expertise in antimicrobial stewardship and hospital epidemiology rated 48 unique criteria across 3 electronic survey rating tools. Criteria were rated primarily based on their impact on patient safety and feasibility for extraction from electronic health record review. The 48 unique criteria were rated by anonymous electronic survey tools, and the results were fed back to the expert panel participants. Consensus was achieved to either retain or remove each criterion.

After 3 rounds, 22 unique criteria remained as part of the opt-out safety checklist. These criteria included high-risk comorbidities, signs of severe illness, lack of cultures during sepsis work-up or antibiotic use prior to blood cultures, or ongoing signs and symptoms of infection.

The modified Delphi approach is a useful method to achieve expert-level consensus in the absence of evidence suifficient to provide validated guidance. The Delphi approach allowed for flexibility in development of an opt-out trial protocol for sepsis antibiotic de-escalation. The utility of this protocol should be evaluated in a randomized controlled trial.

To determine the impact of a documented penicillin or cephalosporin allergy on the development of surgical site infections (SSIs).

Appropriate preoperative antibiotic prophylaxis reduces SSI risk, but documented antibiotic allergies influence the choice of prophylactic agents. Few studies have examined the relationship between a reported antibiotic allergy and risk of SSI and to what extent this relationship is modified by the antibiotic class given for prophylaxis.

We conducted a retrospective cohort study of adult patients undergoing coronary artery bypass, craniotomy, spinal fusion, laminectomy, hip arthroplasty and knee arthroplasty at 3 hospitals from July 1, 2013, to December 31, 2017. We built a multivariable logistic regression model to calculate the adjusted odds ratio (aOR) of developing an SSI among patients with and without patient-reported penicillin or cephalosporin allergies. We also examined effect measure modification (EMM) to determine whether surgical prophylaxis affected the association between reported allergy and SSI.

We analyzed 39,972 procedures; 1,689 (4.2%) with a documented patient penicillin or cephalosporin allergy, and 374 (0.9%) resulted in an SSI. Patients with a reported penicillin or cephalosporin allergy were more likely to develop an SSI compared to patients who did not report an allergy to penicillin or cephalosporins (adjusted odds ratio, 3.26; 95% confidence interval, 2.71–3.93). Surgical prophylaxis did not have significant EMM on this association.

Patients who reported a penicillin or cephalosporin allergy had higher odds of developing an SSI than nonallergic patients. However, the increase in odds is not completely mediated by the type of surgical prophylaxis. Instead, a reported allergy may be a surrogate marker for a more complicated patient population.