Blood and Bone Marrow culture

Blood culture a key test in the management of patients with suspected sepsis/bloodstream infection including those with infective endocarditis, bacteraemia. Samples are placed on a continual monitoring automated blood culture system for upto 5 days. Please indicate where high risk organisms are implicated (such as Neisseria meningitidis, Salmonella typhi). Adult bottles come as a set of 2 ( 1 aerobic and 1 anaerobic) with an optimum fill of 10ml for Paediatric patients please use aerobic bottle only (blue cap). Please ensure patient labels are placed vertically (not around the bottle) or over the bar code as both are required to barcoded on to the analyser. Microbiology will perform microscopy, isolation, identification and susceptibility of any organism likely to be pathogenic. Turn around time 5 days for negatives, positive cultures usually present sooner, significant Gram stain and culture results are telephoned to the ward or clinical team by Microbiology Clinical staff. Occasionally it is appropriate to culture bone marrow in blood culture bottles (e.g. brucella) – please contact Infection SpR (bleep 0132) for advice.