Is admission screening for Pseudomonas aeruginosa useful in haematologic patients? A prospective study with 1310 patients.

Screening for Pseudomonas aeruginosa is recommended to guide empirical antimicrobial therapy in patients on high-risk units. However, evidence for this approach is scarce. We therefore screened 1310 patients with severe haematologic diseases for P. aeruginosa colonization at admission: 108 (8.2%) were positive, but only nine (0.7%; six with the same clone as in the screening isolate) subsequently developed a P. aeruginosa bloodstream infection (positive predictive value of screening, 8.6%; negative predictive value of screening, 99.5%). Routine screening for P. aeruginosa at admission did not sufficiently predict subsequent bloodstream infections caused by P. aeruginosa.