[Primary bacteremia and catheter-related bacteremia due to coagulase-negative staphylococci: is it a non-significant complication?].

Pr imary bact eremia and shor t -t erm cat het er -relat ed bacteremia (PB/ CRB) are relat ively f requent infect ions in cr i t i cal pat ient s. In a recent one-day cross-sect ional prevalence evaluat ion of 1265 Intensive Care Units (ICUs) in 75 count ries, 1 close t o 20% of t he 14,414 pat ient s had a diagnosis of bact eremia or vascular cat het er-relat ed infect ion. In Spain, the data collected by the ENVIN-HELICS regist ry corresponding to t he year 2010 indicate t hat PB/ CRB, excluding secondary bact eremia and ot her f oci , account for approximately 17% of all infect ions cont rolled by the regist ry.2 In the year 2010 an important decrease has been observed f rom 2.48 episodes per 1000 int ravascular (art er ial and cent ral venous) cat het er days in 20093 t o 1.82 episodes in 2010.2 The most common et iology of PB/ CRB corresponds t o coagulase-negat ive St aphylococcus (CNS), represent ing close t o 40% of al l episodes, 2 and 72% of t he episodes pr oduced by gr amposi t i ve st r ai ns. St aphyl ococcus epidermidis causes approximately two-thirds of all PB/ CRB due to CNS, this in turn represent ing 25% of the total. The usual origin is taken to be the surrounding skin and catheter connect ions. Ther e i s a r epeat edl y demonst r at ed si gni f i cant associat ion between the development of infect ion during