Central line-associated bloodstream infections in adult hematology patients with febrile neutropenia: an evaluation of surveillance definitions using differential time to blood culture positivity.

We used differential time to positivity between central and peripheral blood cultures to evaluate the positive predictive value (PPV) of the National Healthcare Safety Network central line-associated bloodstream infection (CLABSI) surveillance definition among hematology patients with febrile neutropenia. The PPV was 27.7%, which suggests that, when the definition is applied to this population, CLABSI rates will be substantially overestimated.