Introduction: Accurate assessment of infection in critically ill patients is vital to their care. Both indiscretion and under-utilization of diagnostic microbiology testing can contribute to inappropriate antibiotic administration or delays in diagnosis. However, indiscretion in diagnostic microbiology cultures may also lead to unnecessary tests that, if false-positive, would incur additional costs and unhelpful evaluations. This quality improvement project objective was to assess pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) clinicians' attitudes and practices around the microbiology work-up for patients with new-onset fever. Methods: We developed and conducted a self-administered electronic survey of PICU clinicians at a single institution. The survey included 7 common clinical vignettes of PICU patients with new-onset fever and asked participants whether they would obtain central line blood cultures, peripheral blood cultures, respiratory aspirate cultures, cerebrospinal fluid cultures, urine cultures, and/or urinalyses. Results: Forty-seven of 54 clinicians (87%) completed the survey. Diagnostic specimen ordering practices were notably heterogeneous. Respondents unanimously favored a decision-support algorithm to guide culture specimen ordering practices for PICU patients with fever (100%, N = 47). A majority (91.5%, N = 43) indicated that a decision-support algorithm would be a means to align PICU and consulting care teams when ordering culture specimens for patients with fever. Conclusion: This survey revealed variability of diagnostic specimen ordering practices for patients with new fever, supporting an opportunity to standardize practices. Clinicians favored a decision-support tool and thought that it would help align patient management between clinical team members. The results will be used to inform future diagnostic stewardship efforts.

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OBJECTIVES: There is variation in microbiology testing among PICU patients with fever offering opportunities to reduce avoidable testing and treatment. Our objective is to describe the development and assess the impact of a novel comprehensive testing algorithm to support judicious testing practices and expanded diagnostic differentials for PICU patients with new fever or instability. DESIGN: A mixed-methods quality improvement study. SETTING: Single-center academic PICU and pediatric cardiac ICU. SUBJECTS: Admitted PICU patients and physicians. INTERVENTIONS: A multidisciplinary team developed a clinical decision-support algorithm. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: We evaluated blood, endotracheal, and urine cultures, urinalyses, and broad-spectrum antibiotic use per 1,000 ICU patient-days using statistical process control charts and incident rate ratios (IRRs) and assessed clinical outcomes 24 months pre- and 18 months postimplementation. We surveyed physicians weekly for 12 months postimplementation. Blood cultures declined by 17% (IRR, 0.83; 95% CI, 0.77–0.89), endotracheal cultures by 26% (IRR, 0.74; 95% CI, 0.63–0.86), and urine cultures by 36% (IRR, 0.64; 95% CI, 0.56–0.73). There was an anticipated rise in urinalysis testing by 23% (IRR, 1.23; 95% CI, 1.14–1.33). Despite higher acuity and fewer brief hospitalizations, mortality, hospital, and PICU readmissions were stable, and PICU length of stay declined. Of the 108 physician surveys, 46 replied (43%), and 39 (85%) recently used the algorithm; 0 reported patient safety concerns, two (4%) provided constructive feedback, and 28 (61%) reported the algorithm improved patient care. CONCLUSIONS: A comprehensive fever algorithm was associated with reductions in blood, endotracheal, and urine cultures and anticipated increase in urinalyses. We detected no patient harm, and physicians reported improved patient care.

BACKGROUND AND AIM: Internationally, there are very few guidelines regarding how near relations can be taken care of on a children's intensive care unit. Despite knowledge about the positive effects of parental presence, staff frequently reject parents out of insecurity. This study aimed to investigate health professionals' understanding of letting parents be present throughout critical situations. METHODS:A qualitative method with semi-structured interviews was used to answer the aim of his study. Nine persons participated in the study, both physicians and nurses. RESULTS:The result showed that health professionals' main view is that parents' presence is positive. However, their presence often has lower priority than the medical focus of the child and the health professionals' concern of failure. CONCLUSIONS:Health professionals have the power to decide if parents can be present in critical situations. Only when a parent demands to be present does that demand beat the decisions made by health professionals. Lack of resources within the team and fear of parents becoming a disturbance or a distraction are cited as the primary reasons not to let parents be present.