Category:Bacteremias

== Background ==

• The presence of bacteria in the blood
• May be primary (associated with intravascular devices or catheters) or secondary (from some focus of infection)
• May be community-acquired (onset within 48 hours of admission) or nosocomial (onset after 48 hours from admission)
• Pseudobacteremia refers to blood culture contamination

Management

• See Staphylococcus aureus bacteremia, separately
• Treat empirically, narrow when possible
• Duration is as usual for underlying source of bacteremia, except Staph. aureus
• Usually not more than 7 days for Gram-negative bacteremia or 14 days for Gram-positive bacteremia