Dark Art of Blood Cultures

At A Glance Understanding the diagnostic methods necessary to identify bloodstream infections. Description This book covers the history of blood cultures, from the first inkling of germs in the mid-1600s to the highly automated systems of today. Purpose The purpose is to provide a dedicated book on the evolution of blood culture technology. These worthy objectives are well met. Audience The audience includes those interested in blood culture technology. It would be of great interest to practicing clinical microbiologists at all levels (bench to doctoral level laboratory directors). Generalist clinical laboratory scientists, generalist laboratory medicine residents, or a subset of technologically savvy infectious disease fellows or practitioners would also enjoy it. The authors are luminaries in the field of clinical microbiology. Features This physically small book contains 320 pages of everything you might want to know about blood cultures. For anyone with two or more decades of experience in the clinical microbiology laboratory, this is truly a walk down memory lane. A real strength is the dedicated focus on different commercially available blood culture systems. If you're in the market for a new blood culture system, this is the book best suited to help you understand their different strengths and weaknesses and inform your choice. Another delight is the inclusion of very practical protocols for how to verify instrument performance in your laboratory, concisely summarized from a variety of professional societies or authoritative standards organizations. The book even has a broad and relatively current discussion of molecular methods for rapid identification and antimicrobial susceptibility testing, albeit without an analysis of cost-effectiveness. A few very, very minor issues: chapter 1, figure 4 did not reproduce well and the didactic point is not obvious. Chapter 9, figure 2 - black font on a dark color background is illegible (what are the organisms in dark squares - e.g. #10 for 1995-2002, #8 for 2014-2015?). I highly recommend high contrast font and background colors for the next edition. A few topics are missing - time to positivity for distinguishing colonized indwelling lines from true bacteremia, the incremental yield of each additional set of blood cultures for patients with true bacteremia, and the length of incubation time related to the recovery of probable true pathogens (short) versus contaminants (long). Finally, the microbiology and lab-centric humor sprinkled throughout the book makes reading enjoyable. Assessment This is a fascinating book on the history and evolution of blood cultures. It is truly unique in its laser focus. For anyone interested in blood cultures and related technology, this is the book to read. Review Questionnaire Range/ Question/ Score 1-10 Are the author's objectives met? 8 1-10 Rate the worthiness of those objectives. 8 1-5 Is this written at an appropriate level? 5 1-5 Is there significant duplication? (1=significant, 5=insignificant) 4 1-5 Are there significant omissions? (1=significant, 5=insignificant) 3 1-5 Rate the authority of the authors. 5 1-5 Are there sufficient illustrations? 3 1-5 Rate the pedagogic value of the illustrations. 3 1-5 Rate the print quality of the illustrations. 3 1-5 Are there sufficient references? 5 1-5 Rate the currency of the references. 4 1-5 Rate the pertinence of the references. 4 1-5 Rate the helpfulness of the index. 4 1-5 If important in this specialty, rate the physical appearance of the book N/A 1-10 Is this a worthwhile contribution to the field? 6 1-10 If this is a 2nd or later edition, is this new edition needed? N/A -Valerie Ng, PhD, MD, (Alameda County Medical Center/Highland Hospital)