Family Health Care

What you need to know ABOUT MRSA

Methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA is quickly becoming a well known term associated with nosocomial infections in hospitals. The incidence of infection with this and other resistant strains of bacteria have been steadily increasing over the past few years. Infections with these microorganisms present many problems, two of which are the lack of available antimicrobial agents that can be used to treat infections and the potential for these organisms to “transfer” their resistance to other types and species of bacteria.

A complete discussion on the mechanics of bacterial resistance is not necessary to understand how to stop transmission of these infections to susceptible patients or other healthcare workers. Current literature cites that the implementation of appropriate infection control measures is the best way to prevent person to person transmission of resistant bacteria. What are appropriate infection control measures? Appropriate Infection control measures would include, but are not limited to, steps aimed at the prevention and control of spread of infectious diseases in susceptible populations. Of these measures, the simplest one is…

WASH YOUR HANDS!!

According to the Standard Precautions as described in the “Guideline for Isolation Precautions in Hospitals”, the following procedures are recommended to prevent the spread of pathogenic organisms:

“Hand-washing should be performed after touching blood, body fluids, secretions, excretions, and contaminated items whether or not gloves are worn. Wash hands immediately after gloves are removed, between patient contacts, and when otherwise indicated to avoid transfer of microorganisms to other patients or environments. It may be necessary to wash hands between tasks and procedures on the same patient to prevent cross-contamination of different body sites.”1

HealthLink offers AloeGuard® Antimicrobial Soap as the solution to the problems of dry skin associated with frequent hand-washing and the need for a soap that kills bacteria, specifically those that are resistant to antimicrobials. Laboratory studies show that AloeGuard® with 0.5% PCMX has been shown to be highly effective against MRSA, as well as numerous other bacteria, yeast and fungi.

AloeGuard® is specially formulated with aloe vera to protect your skin’s delicate balance and to provide the high antimicrobial efficacy necessary for personal protection and reduction of cross contamination with MRSA and other pathogenic organisms.

1.Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol 1996; 17:53-80

April 2003

IS YOUR HOME OR OFFICE PROTECTED FROM HARMFUL BACTERIA?

Hospitals and Doctors offices use alcohol based product to kill all sorts of harmful bacteria.  When using disinfectant wipes or liquids to kill those germs that affect your co-workers or family members you should use what health care professionals use.  Alcohol based products kill the Aids Virus (HIV-1), Swine Flu (H1N1), Hepatitis A, B and C, MRSA, Herpes, VRE and Tuberculosis.  Antiseptic or antimicrobial hand wipes, gels and liquids are normally emulsified with soothing aloe or other skin friendly components that protect you from irritating reactions that pure alcohol can cause.  The harsh treatment of bleaches and other highly toxic products are avoided when using alcohol based sanitizers.

In our work environments we are often using shared equipment, facilities and other work related aids.  It is critical for us to constantly keep a clean and germ free work area that promotes the health and safety of ourselves and our colleagues.  You may want to consider various dispensers, pumps, spray bottles, aerosol sprays or squeeze bottles in the work area that will quickly provide the right amount of disinfectant or antiseptic for the job at hand.  Bulk purchases of liquids by the gallon can be used to refill the smaller dispensers as well as used for larger clean up jobs.  See what products are available. It should be noted that OSHA inspectors are advising medical facilities to use products that routinely kill MRSA, the Aids Virus and the Hepatitis Viruses.  One of the key advantages to alcohol based antiseptics and disinfectants is that the micro organisms do not build up a tolerance to the kill factors in these germicidal products, it’s not like antibiotics that allow the bugs to become resistant to the killing mechanisms.

For those of us that have been so unfortunate as to contract the various virus and bacterial based diseases like Aides, Herpes, MRSA, VRE, Hepatitis, etc. we know we can’t be cured by now performing the preventive actions of cleaning skin and surfaces before use.  However by assuring that we do have properly cleaned surfaces of common areas, common equipment and tools we can certainly help to stop the spread of these highly infectious maladies.  In our office environments today with people using communal phones, key boards, bathroom facilities and furniture items we have a difficult time protecting everyone from a possible infection.  In our homes with children and pets constantly running in and out along with  delivery people, vendors, service personnel and even visiting family and friends we are hard pressed to maintain a germ free environment.  Using wipes, sprays, gels, aerosols, liquids and soaps we can assure ourselves of a much higher level of protection from threatening germs, viruses and micro organisms.

The story of my son’s encounter with MRSA…

by Deneene A. Collins

It all started one day when my son was complaining about a bump on his chin. He said that the bump hurt him but since he is twelve going on thirteen I thought it was just one of those painful pimples adolescents get from time to time. So we treated it like a pimple but it wouldn’t go away. He picked at the bump which made it worse and day by day it got larger, red and puss filled to the point where he could feel it inside of his mouth and it hurt him to eat.

After he kept complaining about it for about a week I came to the conclusion that maybe it wasn’t just a pimple but I still didn’t know what it was and thought it might be an insect or spider bite of some kind. Since some spider bites can be dangerous I decided to take him to the doctor to have it looked at and boy am I glad that I did.

I never really heard of MRSA, nor did I know how serious it was. Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA) is a bacterial infection which is a living organism that can commonly cause skin and other types of infections. Some of the signs and symptoms of the disease include: cellulitis, bumps on the skin, boils, abscesses, a sty, carbuncles, impetigo or other collections of puss in and under the skin. I found out that MRSA can be fatal in very serious cases. According to statistics from the Kaiser foundation in 2007 the mortality rate among hospitalized MRSA patients is estimated to be between 4% – 10%. In my research I also found out that more people die from MRSA in the United States every year than from AIDS. It became evident that we were dealing with a possible life threatening disease that we thought was just a pimple or bug bite.

The first clinic we got to was closing but the nurse practitioner took one glance at my son and said that it could be MRSA and that I needed to clean and cover the soar and get him to a doctor right away. No clinics were open so I purchased an over the counter aseptic and some bandages to get us through the night.

That night, when we applied the aseptic my son was in serious pain and the soar ruptured in his sleep due to the aseptic working on the infection. When the bump burst it even bled through the bandages. First thing in the morning I took him to urgent care and the doctor knew what it was immediately. She squeezed and squeezed the bump pushing puss out of it and took a culture to send to the lab. Antibiotics were prescribed for ten days and we received instructions to wash the sore with warm soapy water at least twice a day. The doctor also instructed us to apply hot compresses to the infected area 4 to 5 times a day so that it would come to a head and drain properly. It was also vitally important to keep the infected area completely covered with a bandage during the day and he had to wash his hands often.

MRSA Staff Infection is highly contagious and can be contracted simply by touching something an infected person has touched with the infection on their hands and then touching yourself somewhere. Trust me when I say that as humans we don’t realize how many things we touch before rubbing our eyes or touching our faces and bodies. Just think about the items you touch in a store like the shopping cart someone else you don’t even know just used or the credit card payment machine. Don’t be germophobic but come into a greater awareness of all the places where germs can and do exist.

The doctor emphasized that no one should even use the same bathroom as my son if possible and absolutely under no circumstances should anyone use the same towel he had used not even to dry their hands. We still don’t know where my son contracted MRSA from but since this type of infection has become popular as a community associated disease it can come from anywhere. My son plays baseball so he could have gotten it from wearing the catcher’s mask or by touching equipment that had the disease on it from someone else. He also could have easily gotten from a school desk or counter top, the school restroom or even a borrowed pen.

We were extremely blessed that my son’s case of MRSA was caught early and easily treated. Some others have not been so fortunate. I remember a client of mine telling me many years ago that she got MRSA from getting a staple in her finger at work and by the time she was treated her blood was poisoned and she had to have IV treatments for a number of months. Back then I didn’t know what MRSA was but I remembered her experience when my son was diagnosed. To truly diagnose the disease you have to get the lab results back but the disease can be so deadly it is important to treat it as MRSA right away if MRSA is suspected and not wait on the results to start taking action.

Another incident I heard of from a friend was about her brother that had MRSA but it was misdiagnosed as a spider bite so he was given the wrong treatment while the MRSA got worse. By the time the doctors found out what it really was he had to have the infected area cut open and dug out almost reaching down to his bone. If MRSA is not properly treated and if all the infection is not removed it can come back and require further treatment. If you have a child with MRSA make sure you notify the school nurse and oversee the treatment of the disease carefully. It is also very important that the entire antibiotic treatment is taken to the very end and a follow up visit to the doctor is recommended upon completion of the antibiotics. As always, when taking antibiotics, plenty of water should be consumed.

MRSA can be fatal so kill it before it kills you! The steps to take are simple really. You’ve already taken the first step by reading this article and educating yourself about this disease. If you suspect that you or someone you know may have MRSA please see a doctor right away. Here are some tips for you to follow regarding MRSA:

- Seek early diagnosis and treatment if you suspect you may have MRSA due to puss filled, red, soar or irritated areas on your body and skin.
- Take the full prescription of antibiotics prescribed by your doctor.
- Wash your hands often and clean surfaces with germ killing substances or wipes.
- Do not come into physical contact with someone you know has been diagnosed with MRSA.
- Keep soars and infected areas clean and covered.
- Stay informed and live healthy.

MRSA Superbug By Bob Schmuck

Seeing or hearing the letters, MRSA together brings fear to most people because MRSA is known as a superbug. With movies like Pandemic, Virus, Epidemic, The Andromeda Strain, The Outbreak, Panic in the Streets, and other similar movies, people can vividly picture a worse case scenario when it comes to “superbugs”. Separating fact from fiction about MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) can calm fears and prevent the spread of this infection.

Though recently MRSA has become newsworthy, its history started many years ago when antibiotics were believed to be a cure all. Patents actively requested antibiotics and doctors freely prescribed them. Staphylococcus proved to be smarter than humans and mutated to survive. A strain developed that is resistant to common antibiotic treatment and it no longer is confined to hospitals (up to 33% of the population are carriers).

MRSA Fact And Fiction:

1. •Fiction-MRSA is a superbug that cannot be treated with antibiotics.
2. •Fact-MRSA can be treated with antibiotics. It is the penicillin related (like methicillin) antibiotics that are ineffective on MRSA.
3. •Fiction-MRSA is a superbug that will kill you.
4. •Fact-MRSA can be treated in healthy adults. Early detection reduces the risk of death for everyone. Young children and anyone with a compromised immune system is at a higher risk for death from MRSA. Many people who contract MRSA are in hospitals, nursing facilities, and other places that care for people who are ill to begin with.
5. •Fiction-MRSA is only found in hospitals.
6. •Fact-About 33% of the population are MRSA carriers (it lives primarily in the nose). Nursing homes, gymnasiums, and businesses have MRSA on many of its surfaces that are commonly touched.

The prevention of MRSA:

1. •Prevention of MRSA is as easy as washing your hands and using hand disinfectant. This should be done when touching common areas in public places, especially in hospitals. Any time someone touches their nose they should wash their hands. Parents and caregivers should also wash their hands when helping someone who cannot wipe their own nose.
2. •Build a strong immune system by eating right, taking supplements, getting adequate rest, and reducing stress to prevent the superbug MRSA from causing an infection when there is unavoidable contact with the infection.
3. •Keep open sores clean and when need be, covered.

Recognizing MRSA Signs And Symptoms:

1. •All Staph infections, including MRSA, will begin as small red bumps that look like pimples, boils or spider bites.
2. •A deep and painful abscess that requires medical intervention like surgical draining.
3. •When an MRSA bacterium spreads deep into the body, it can cause infections in bones, joints, surgical wounds, the bloodstream, heart valves, and lungs. For some, this infection can be life-threatening.

Treatment of MRSA:

1. •Before antibiotics are started for a skin infection, a health care professional should test it for staph bacteria (which includes MRSA), to prescribe the most effective treatment.
2. •Treatment of MRSA won’t always include antibiotics. To avoid outbreaks of vancomycin-resistant MRSA, vancomycin may be saved for those most at risk of the infection spreading and those most at risk for death. In healthy people, some doctors may choose to drain an abscess caused by MRSA rather than treat the infection with drugs. Some hospitals are already seeing vancomycin-resistant MRSA.

Alternative medicine and MRSA:

1. •Manuka honey kills MRSA (remember, honey never should be given internally to anyone under 1 year old)
2. •Colloidal silver kills MRSA
3. •Tea tree oil kills MRSA

Using alternative medicine to find out other treatments that are effective should be done with the supervision of someone who is professionally trained in that area and with the supervision of a health care professional who can test the effectiveness.

Though there are parts of the population that are at higher risk for complications and even death from the superbug, MRSA, it is still a treatable and preventable infection for a high percentage of the population.

What is MRSA? Symptoms and Prevention

By Brandon Johnsonn

You’ve probably seen the recent headlines about this menacing “super bug” ravaging through hospitals, gyms, and even schools.
MRSA stands for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. This is a fancy way of saying that an MRSA staph infection is resistant to most antibiotics, and thus, harder to treat.
The important thing to remember is that MRSA isn’t new. The threat has been around for many years, but a recent report from the American Medical Association highlighted the number of deaths it caused in 2005 (nineteen thousand). That report, combined with the untimely death of a 17-year-old student due to the infection, sparked fear in the hearts of many parents and hospital patients.

MRSA Symptoms
One of the reasons many cases of MRSA go untreated is that the symptoms are fairly common among several other illnesses. Some of the most common MRSA symptoms are simply flu-like in nature or, in some cases, red pimples or boils that seem to last longer than they should.
Still, if you feel you may have been exposed to the bacteria, you should visit your doctor immediately at the first sign of any trouble. If caught early enough, almost every case is fully treatable.

MRSA Prevention
Of course, the best way to deal with MRSA is to simply prevent it in the first place. And, it’s actually easier than you might expect:

Wash your hands. It seems easy enough, and you’ve been hearing it since you were a kid, but it really is one of the most effective ways to prevent MRSA, in addition to several other illnesses. “It is not glamorous but it is very true – hand hygiene is by far the best means to prevent the spread of all diseases,” said Dr. Arjun Srinivasan, an epidemiologist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Cover up. Cover all scrapes, cuts, or any other open wounds with bandages and/or band-aids. If MRSA makes its way into your bloodstream, that’s when it can quickly become potentially fatal.

Ban the barefoot. If you frequent your local gym locker room, be sure to wear sandals (even in the showers). This will help keep your feet from coming in direct contact with bacteria others may have left in your path.

Wipe it down. Always carry a towel with you when you workout, so you can wipe down any equipment that others may have inconsiderately left sweaty.

Nearly every case of MRSA is spread by direct contact, rather than through the air, which is why good hygiene is the most important and effective way to stay healthy.

Have you or anyone you know been infected by MRSA?