Contamination of subclavian vein catheters: an intraluminal culture method.

An intraluminal culture method was evaluated for central venous catheters and compared to conventional catheter tip cultures and cultures from the insertion site. The colonization-rate of the catheters was 43.7% using conventional tip culture, 34.4% with the intraluminal method and 40.1% at the skin puncture site. Only 37.5% of the catheters showed identical bacteria at the skin puncture site and catheter-tip, compared with 87.5% between intraluminal culture and catheter-tip culture (P less than 0.05).