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No it's not really a suspicion, just a part of our protocol. We culture all suspected transfusion reactions. Hmmm .. reading the responses and not sure if it's overkill. In over 25 years we've only had one positive culture. It was before using the fenwal coupler device. We used to "bleed" the tubing that was used for transfusion, to get our micro specimen for culture. In that incident, the patient had a UTI from Klebsiella. She eventually became septic with Klebsiella PRIOR to transfusion. The culture came back positive for Klebsiella. Fortunately after we cultured the contents inside the original bag (we sent the whole bag to micro at this point), nothing grew out. We found out that the nurse took the blood bag, laid it on the bedside table for a few minutes while phoning the MD for possible transfusion reaction. She then clamped it off after phoning the MD. It was concluded the Klebsiella was from the backflow of blood from the patient's arm into the tubing. Thank goodness the order of events were clearly tracked and documented.