Posted on 10/20/2007 12:26:44 PM PDT by Altura Ct.
WASHINGTON -- School and public health officials are trying to calm the fears of parents who have flooded their phones with questions about an antibiotic-resistant strain of staph infection.
D.C. Officials have confirmed at least one case of staph infection in D.C. Public Schools. A teacher from Davis Elementary School in Southeast is the latest person to be diagnosed.
The D.C. Department of Health is investigating reports of a staph infection from two teachers at Drew Elementary School in Northeast, but the cases have not been confirmed.
Parents of D.C. Public School students received automated phone calls Thursday night informing them of ways to prevent the infection. A letter from D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee is being sent home with students on Friday.
There is at least one case of staph infection at the University of Maryland. A student was diagnosed this week and has been in the hospital for several days. A university official tells The Diamondback the student is responding to treatment.
Three D.C. Fire and EMS Department recruits have also contracted staph infections. One recruit contracted the infection on Oct. 12 and two other recruits were diagnosed Thursday, D.C. Fire and EMS spokesman Tony Dorsey says.
All of the recruits are receiving medical treatment and training academy officials decontaminated the facility last week, Dorsey says.
On Thursday, Prince William County Public Schools confirmed six cases of Methicillin-Resistant Staph Aureus -- or MRSA.
The cases were reported at Battlefield, Garfield and Forest Park High schools and West Ridge Elementary School, a school spokesman says.
Approximately 14 Montgomery County Public School students, mostly athletes, have been diagnosed with staph infections and 13 of the cases are MRSA, Montgomery County Public Schools spokesman Brian Edwards says.
Eight schools -- Sherwood, Walt Whitman, Poolesville, Quince Orchard and Rockville High schools and Laytonsville, Damascus and Candlewood Elementary schools -- have reported cases of MRSA, Edwards says.
All of the infected students are being treated with antibiotics, Montgomery County Public Schools Superintendent Jerry Weast wrote in a letter to parents.
In Fairfax County, there have been six cases of staph infection reported, but it is not known if any of the cases are the MRSA strain, a school spokesman says. There are two cases reported at Thomas Jefferson High School; one case at Fairfax High School; one case at Herndon High School; and two cases at Robinson Secondary School.
Cases have also been reported in Anne Arundel County. There have been no reported cases in Prince George's and Frederick counties.
MRSA is a strain of staph bacteria that does not respond to penicillin and related antibiotics but can be treated with other drugs. The infection can be spread by skin-to-skin contact or sharing an item used by an infected person, particularly one with an open wound or runny nose, such as razors, soap, clothing, or towels.
Officials are taking additional steps at schools with suspected or confirmed MRSA cases. Locker rooms, weight rooms and physical education areas are being cleaned with a 1 to 10 bleach solution and disinfectant wipes are being provided to students.
Jon Almquist, an administrator with Fairfax County Public Schools Athletic Training Program, says the best way to avoid transmission is to "always wash your hands."
Students should also make sure "any break in your skin is appropriately covered and you don't come in contact with anyone's open wound," Almquist says.
School athletes should also take special precautions.
"Be careful of sharing things like water bottles," Almquist says.
Other steps to prevent the spread of MRSA include:
Wash hands thoroughly with soap and water or use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer; Keep cuts and scrapes clean and covered with a bandage until healed; Avoid contact with other people's wounds and bandages; Avoid sharing personal items such as towels or razors Wipe surfaces of exercise equipment before and after use. MRSA can look like an infected pimple or boil and can worsen to include redness, warmth, swelling, pain, and discharge.The infection can also be mistaken as a spider or insect bite.
Health officials say it is important to treat suspected MRSA early. Parents who are concerned about an unusual looking sore or wound that takes a long time to heal should consult their family's doctor.
Montgomery County Health Officer Dr. Ulder J. Tilman recommends that any draining sore or wound be cultured for MRSA.
On Monday, 17-year-old Ashton Bonds, a senior at Staunton River High School in Bedford, Va., died after being diagnosed with MRSA.
That's the trouble with MRSA, a kid just thinks it's a sore and then it develops into sepsis.
A friend of mine has a son who contracted MRSA last year while he was in college (he was part of a wrestling program at a college in PA.) Luckily the coach recognized the sore on the kids leg as something that should be checked out and it was caught early and cleared up with IV antibiotics.
I have a nephew in the hospital now with staph. Sore on his hand from lifting weights. IV antibiotics going in for the third day. Serious stuff.
Is MRSA one of those things that we have lost the ability to fight with our immune systems because we are too clean? Or is this one that has always been a nasty bug?
I have noticed that the less a kid plays in the dirt growing up the less able they are to fight off some illnesses. That could only be a perception though.
In New Hampshire, it’s in the high schools, and a 4-yr old girl died of it recently.
MRSA thrived in hospitals and nursing homes for years. That was the only place you seemed to have been susceptible to it. My FIL died from it after he had an operation.
The “bug” has become resistent to most antibiotics (there are still a few that can be used on it)...and I would say that probably overuse of antibiotics, in general, is what has made the bacteria that way.
Particular immune response, of course, would play a factor, but that would be specifically if someone was immune suppressed, like somebody had HIV or on steroid treatment.
Young men getting MRSA from gyms, etc. just probably has more to do with the bacteria moving outside of a hospital where it can thrive into a gym or school where the same type of conditions allow it to thrive.
IIRC, this superbug mutated from regular ones, after antibiotics were abused, in hospitals and other places.
This is the reason why doctors insist on people to complete a course of antibiotics, if ever they are administered one. Taking antibiotics to a point that is less than that required to completely eliminate the pathogen might lead to the surviving/ weakened (but not killed) pathogens into mutating to a form that can resist the antibiotic in future. This happens otherwise also, but usually, taking an antibiotic part-course, will serve the bacteria as a sort of vaccination, for it to survive the same antibiotic, in future.
Prayers for your nephew. It’s nothing to mess around with. I had an pneumonia, post surgery this year and they were pretty nervous that it might be MRSA related. When it turned out not to be, the pulmonologist breathed a sign of relief. Although I still had to be in the hospital on IV antibiotics for 5 days, he told me the treatment was straightforward. He said if it had been hospital acquired MRSA...things would have been more “dicey” (his exact words.)
Calm down, folks. The uninformed media has really turned this into a hysteria. MRSA (methicillin resistant staph. aureus) is very prevalent. I see it every day over a dozen times in my busy emergency department. Having MRSA does NOT mean that it’s untreatable. It ain’t the plague! The majority of MRSA cases are succeptible to the following antibiotics that have existed for ages:
Tetracycline, Doxycycline
Trimethoprim/Sulfamethoxazole (Bactrim DS)
Rifampin
Clindamycin
These big guns IV antibiotics are also commonly used:
Vancomycin
Daptomycin (Cubicin)
Zyvox
Bactroban (mupirocin), a topical ointment/cream, is often used and applied intranasally for treatment of carriers.
The majority of Community Acquired MRSA cases are in the form of cutaneous abscesses that can be easily treated. The treatment for these is adequate incision and drainage, proper wound care (sterile whirlpool is necessary in some severe cases), and antibiotics.
More serious cases such as sepsis due to MRSA pneumonia do exist but overall, death secondary to MRSA is rare.
As for any other disease, early recognition is key to the treatment of MRSA. It is so ubiquitous these days that clinicians will assume that an infected wound/sore/abscess is MRSA and treated as such until proven otherwise. So if you get a little sore, don’t let it fester into a huge abscess. Get it looked at and treated early. And if you keep on getting recurrent sores, you’ll need to be treated as a carrier and so does the rest of the family. Additionally your home (or work environment, etc.) needs to me sanitized (steam cleaning the carpet, wipe down commonly touched areas and floors with antiseptic cleaners, wash hands often with antibacterial soaps, ect...). Hygiene is key!
The national average for MRSA cases seen in the hospital setting is roughly 7%. At the hospital where I work at, it’s ~9.5%.
I have noticed that the less a kid plays in the dirt growing up the less able they are to fight off some illnesses. That could only be a perception though.
Exactly what I want to know.
I’ve read where silver is extremely effective in treating MRSA. I googled it and there is even silver bandages, pajamas and bed linens.
The staph has always been there. The knowledge of its presence has spread.
Ping.
I’m not so certain the media is uninformed as they are seeking a panic button in order to push universal health care. Then again, I’m probably just being a little too suspicious, but since it involves children, it does seem made-to-order. Thank you for the information.
Maryland “Freak State” PING!
According to my wife, yes.
She wonders if it has to do with anti-bacterial soap.
My daughter, who is a RN, says if you kill off all the known bacteria the only ones left are the ones we don't kill, eg staph.
Who knows??
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