A study from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill published online last week in the peer-reviewed Journal of Clinical Microbiology illustrates the impact of the Verigene® Gram-Positive Blood Culture Test (BC-GP) on treatment optimization for patients with streptococcal and enterococcal bacteremia. It is the first study to investigate the clinical impact of a rapid blood culture test on patients with streptococcal bacteremia.
The study found that implementation of BC-GP led to:
- 11.3-hour reduction in overall time to acceptable antibiotic (1.9 versus 13.2 hours; p = 0.04)
- 39.5-hour reduction in time to appropriate antibiotic for patients with vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus (VRE) bloodstream infection (4.2 versus 43.7 hours; p = 0.006)
- 6.9-hour reduction in time to appropriate antibiotics for patients with viridans group Streptococcus bloodstream infection (0.2 versus 7.1 hours; p = 0.02)
This study used a quasi-experimental design comparing pre- and post-intervention groups over a 17 month period. After application of exclusion criteria, the final outcomes analysis was performed across 74 cases and 65 controls from patients with Gram stains positive for gram-positive cocci in pairs and/or chains.
These findings add to the growing body of evidence depicting the clinical impact of rapid blood culture diagnostics.