Urine collection methods for infants under 3 months of age in clinical practice

Background Methods of urine collection used in precontinent children are a controversial issue. Definitive diagnosis of urinary tract infection (UTI) requires an uncontaminated urine culture. We aimed to describe methods used to collect urine for culture in infants under 3 months of age and compare results and contamination rates. Methods This retrospective observational cohort study included 721 urine cultures collected from infants Results Median patient age was 36 days and 54.6% were male. In total, 592 (82.1%) samples were collected using clean-catch urine stimulation technique (CCUST), 77 (10.7%) by urethral catheterization (UC) and 52 (7.2%) by urine bag (UB). Positive cultures were obtained in 11.7% (95% confidence interval [CI] 9.1, 14.3) of CCUST samples and in 28.6% (95% CI 18.5, 38.7) of UC samples (p Conclusions CCUST is the most commonly used method in our hospital for collecting urine in infants younger than 3 months. The contamination rate of UC is lower but not significantly different to that of CCUST. Urine collection by CCUST serves as a non-invasive alternative to UC for diagnosis of UTI in infants under 3 months of age in routine clinical practice.
Author(s): María Luisa Herreros [sup.1] [sup.2] , Pablo Gili [sup.3] , Rut del Valle [sup.1] [sup.2] , Ana Barrios [sup.1] [sup.2] , Mónica Pacheco [sup.1] [sup.2] , Aida Sánchez [sup.4] [...]