HHS urges healthcare providers to conserve blood culture media amid shortage

U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra on Friday urged health care providers to conserve blood culture media bottles and said HHS is taking action to resolve the vials shortage as quickly as possible.

“HHS and the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) are working closely with the manufacturer and other partners to accelerate rapid resolution of the shortage, including expediting any necessary review (e.g., for shelf-life extension), meeting with alternative suppliers, and communicating best practices and conservation strategies,” Becerra’s statement read.

Becerra said his department is aware of disruptions in the availability of BD BACTEC blood culture media bottles.

“We recommend that health care providers, laboratory professionals, and health care facility administrators prioritize and conserve BD BACTEC blood culture media bottles per FDA’s published recommendations during this shortage,” Becerra said.

The Becton Dickinson company said in a July statement, “BD is experiencing reduced availability of blood culture vials from our supplier …. As an additional stopgap measure, our former supplier of glass vials will restart production to help fill the intermittent gap in supply.”

BD said it is “fully focused on returning the supply of blood culture vials to normal levels.”

A CDC health advisory in late July warned that, “This shortage has the potential to disrupt patient care by leading to delays in diagnosis, misdiagnosis, or other challenges in the clinical management of patients with certain infectious diseases.”