Divestiture - Additional Information (Detail) - Respiratory Solutions - USD ($) $ in Millions	3 Months Ended
Dec. 31, 2015	Oct. 03, 2016
Income Statement, Balance Sheet and Additional Disclosures by Disposal Groups, Including Discontinued Operations [Line Items]
Revenues	$ 208
Disposal Group, Held-for-sale, Not Discontinued Operations
Income Statement, Balance Sheet and Additional Disclosures by Disposal Groups, Including Discontinued Operations [Line Items]
Disposal group, percent of business sold		50.10%
Disposal group, percent of business retained		49.90%

Percent, after disposal, of ownership interest of a divested business in which an equity method investment is retained.

No definition available.

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Namespace Prefix:	bdx_
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Period Type:	instant

- Definition

Percent of ownership interest in a business that is sold in a disposal transaction.

+ References

No definition available.

+ Details

Name:	bdx_DisposalGroupIncludingDiscontinuedOperationPercentOfBusinessSold
Namespace Prefix:	bdx_
Data Type:	num:percentItemType
Balance Type:	na
Period Type:	instant

- Definition

Amount of revenue attributable to disposal group, including, but not limited to, discontinued operation.

+ References

Reference 1: http://www.xbrl.org/2003/role/presentationRef
-Publisher FASB
-Name Accounting Standards Codification
-Topic 205
-SubTopic 20
-Section 50
-Paragraph 5B
-Subparagraph (b)
-URI http://asc.fasb.org/extlink&oid=64827811&loc=SL51721673-107760

+ Details

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Balance Type:	credit
Period Type:	duration

- Definition

Line items represent financial concepts included in a table. These concepts are used to disclose reportable information associated with domain members defined in one or many axes to the table.

+ References

No definition available.

+ Details

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- Details

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- Details

Name:	us-gaap_DisposalGroupClassificationAxis=us-gaap_DisposalGroupHeldforsaleNotDiscontinuedOperationsMember
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