title: Microbiological monitoring of aortic aneurysm sac contents during abdominal aneurysmectomy: results in 176 patients and review of the literature.
abstract: To investigate the clinical significance of intraoperative cultures, aneurysmal thrombus was cultured in 176 patients with clinically non suspected infected abdominal aortic aneurysm. The incidence of positive cultures was 14.2% and 88% of the microorganisms were Gram-positive. Differences between elective and urgent reconstruction were not significant. During follow-up, there were no cases of graft infection in either group. Review of the literature shows a positive culture rate of 19% in a series of 1867 patients. 93% Of the microorganisms are Gram-positive and 78% are considered as contaminants. The incidence of graft infection is 1.99% in the group with positive culture and 0.7% in the series with negative culture (P = 0.06). It is concluded that the clinical significance of routine cultures in clinically non suspected infected aortic aneurysms is negligible.
authors.affiliation: Department of Vascular Surgery, UZ Gasthuisberg, Leuven, België.
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Fourneau
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Nevelsteen
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Lacroix
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Suy
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D017544:Aortic Aneurysm, Abdominal / Q000382:microbiology* / Q000601:surgery; D001019:Aortic Rupture / Q000382:microbiology / Q000601:surgery; D001807:Blood Vessel Prosthesis; D005260:Female; D006094:Gram-Positive Bacteria / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D016459:Prosthesis-Related Infections / Q000382:microbiology; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D013927:Thrombosis / Q000382:microbiology