Clinical and Economic Outcomes Associated with Rapid Antimicrobial Susceptibility Reporting and Dual-Card Testing in ICU Bloodstream Infections

Purpose

To evaluate the clinical and economic outcomes associated with implementation of an optimized blood culture workflow in intensive care unit (ICU) patients with bloodstream infections. Patients and methods: From March 2022 to June 2023, the laboratory implemented a multi-modal workflow optimization including satellite blood culture incubation in the emergency department, upgraded blood culture bottles, rapid MALDI-TOF MS identification, automated rapid antimicrobial susceptibility testing (AST) reporting, and dual AST cards for Gram-negative bacteria. The pre-optimization group included 107 adult ICU patients with positive blood cultures (March 2021 - February 2022). The post-optimization group included 153 patients (September 2023 - August 2024).