Antimicrobial culture and susceptibility testing has little value for routine management of secondary bacterial peritonitis.

Abstract

The traditional surgical practice of routinely culturing specimens from patients with community-acquired intraabdominal infections, such as appendicitis, contributes little to the management of the individual patient, either initially or later when infectious complications have developed. Instead of performing routine cultures for peritonitis, a modified approach that still facilitates hospital surveillance for microbial resistance patterns should be used.