Bacterial Culture and Gram Stain, Tissue




Test Mnemonic

TISCUL

Primary CPT Codes

  • 87205 - QTY (1), Smear, Gram Stain
  • 87176 - QTY (1), Processing, Tissue Homogenization
  • 87070 - QTY (1), Culture, Bacterial, Aerobic

Variable CPT Codes (dependent on findings)

  • 87077 - QTY (1), Identification, Aerobic Isolate
  • 87106 - QTY (1), Identification, Yeast
  • 87153 - QTY (1), Identification, Nucleic Acid Sequencing
  • 87181 - QTY (1), Susceptibility, Agar Dilution, per agent
  • 87184 - QTY (1), Susceptibility, Disk Method, per plate
  • 87185 - QTY (1), Susceptibility, Enzyme Detection, per enzyme
  • 87186 - QTY (1), Susceptibility, Multi-antimicrobial
  • 87186 - QTY (1), Susceptibility, Multi-antimicrobial Phoenix
  • 87186 - QTY (1), Susceptibility, Multi-antimicrobial Vitek
  • 87186 - QTY (1), Susceptibility, Multi-antimicrobial Sensititre
  • 87076 - QTY (1), Identification, Anaerobic Isolate
  • 87182 - QTY (1), Susceptibility, Carbapenamase enzyme detection, per isolate

LOINC ®

43408-4

Aliases

  • Culture, Aerobic Tissue
  • Culture, Anaerobic Tissue

Performing Laboratory

Cleveland Clinic Laboratories


Specimen Requirements

Volume Type Container Collect Temperature Transport Temperature Special Instructions
VariableTissueSterile container Refrigerated 

Stability

Environmental Condition Description
Ambient24 hours
Refrigerated24 hours
FrozenUnacceptable

Days Performed

Sun - Sat

Turnaround Time

11 days

Methodology

Name Description
Culture 
Stain 

Reference Range

Special Info

Add drops of sterile saline to keep small pieces of tissue moist. If culture is positive, identification will be performed on clinically significant organisms at an additional charge. Antimicrobial susceptibilities are performed when indicated. Additional billing is applied for identification and susceptibility testing. CPT codes vary based on methodology

Clinical Info

Media and incubation conditions are employed for the recovery of aerobic and anaerobic bacteria. All tissue cultures are incubated for a minimum of 3 days. Brain, bone and heart valve specimens are incubated for 5 days. Shoulder, hip or knee tissue submitted to diagnose a prosthetic joint infection includes a thioglycollate broth culture with 14 day incubation; broth culture with extended incubation also occurs if "Cutibacterium acnes” is selected in the Rule Out field when ordering.