Controlled comparison of a new Becton Dickinson agar slant blood culture system with Roche Septi-Chek for the detection of bacteremia and fungemia.

Two commercially available agar slide blood culture systems, Septi-Chek (Roche Diagnostics, Div. Hoffmann-La Roche Inc., Nutley, N.J.) and VACUTAINER agar slant (Becton Dickinson [BD] Vacutainer Systems, Rutherford, N.J.), were compared in 5,628 paired blood cultures from adult patients. The systems were inoculated with equal volumes (5 ml) of blood. There was no statistically significant difference between the two systems in the overall recovery of clinically important microorganisms; however, significantly more Escherichia coli (P less than 0.05) organisms were detected in the Septi-Chek system. Concurrently, significantly more contaminants (P less than 0.001) also were present in Septi-Chek bottles. When microorganisms grew in both systems, there was no significant difference in the time to recovery of important organisms, except that anaerobes were detected more quickly in the BD system. This study suggests that the BD VACUTAINER agar slant is an acceptable alternative to the Septi-Chek system for routine blood cultures.