Could screening stop the spread of MRSA?

New research into methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) by Dutch researchers has found that MRSA is mainly spread by patients moving between hospitals, leading to calls for patients who frequent many hospitals with Europe to be screened for the bug.

MRSA is a potentially lethal bug which is difficult to combat because it has developed resistance to some antibiotics. MRSA causes difficult-to-treat infections such as blood poisoning and pneumonia.

The authors of the study have called for more screening of people who are repeatedly admitted to different hospitals to try to break this transmission cycle, the BBC state.

"Our study suggests that screening patients who have recently been in another hospital or healthcare institution would be very wise," Hajo Grundmann of the University Medical Center in Groningen, the Netherlands, who led the study said to Reuters.

There hope, is that if the circle is broken, then it would eventually eradicate MRSA.

Their research, which was published in the journal, PloS Medicine, involved a large study of the geographical location of different strains of MRSA across 26 European countries, where they analysed samples from 450 hospitals.

The aim

The aim of the research was to find out about the distribution of the different strains, so that they could try and shed light on how the infections spreads.

Grundmann said, "To my utter surprise, we found that MRSA strains were geographically concentrated."

He concluded that the distribution of MRSA suggested it is transmitted by patients who frequent different hospitals, rather than being spread in the community.

"MRSA appears to be spread by patients who ping-pong around between hospitals. These are often frail or elderly people with on-going health problems.

"The exciting thing is that if we know that MRSA is spread by this core group who are going back and forth between hospitals, we can do something about it and we may ultimately be able to eradicate MRSA.

"The message of this report is that doctors should try to identify people who often move between hospitals or other health care institutions such as nursing homes and they should be screened for MRSA."

The Health Protection Agency said it was already well known that MRSA infections usually occurred in hospitals, and that nursing and residential homes have had problems with MRSA colonisation.

A spokesperson for the HPA said, "The Department of Health has established a policy that across the NHS all relevant elective admissions should be tested for the presence of MRSA, extending to all admissions - including emergencies - by 2010/11.

"This enables treatment, for example, special washes or ointments to be given to reduce or clear MRSA in patients before surgery."

Interactive map

Doctors will be able to use an interactive map from the study, which is also available to the public, which gives information on MRSA strains in different locations.

"This research is a tour de force," said Professor Richard James, director of the Centre for Healthcare Associated Infections at the University of Nottingham.

Adding, "Community-acquired MRSA strains cause infections in younger people in the community who have had little contact with healthcare systems. These are unfortunately much less likely to be controlled by interventions that reduce transmission of hospital-acquired MRSA strains."

Cost

Drug-resistant bacteria is a growing problem in hospitals worldwide. Staff who fail to wash their hands are often blamed for spreading such infections. The bacteria kills around 25,000 people a year in Europe and around 19,000 in the United States.

The European Center for Disease Prevention and Control, which monitors and advises on disease in the European Union, calculates that super-bug infections are responsible for 900 million euros a year in extra hospital costs, and a further 600 million euros a year in lost productivity, Reuters states.

 

Like this article? Get the RSS feed:

blog comments powered by Disqus