Importantly, one of the common repositories for MRSA is in the nostrils. Lots of people carry it there without it causing infection.
This matters because if your immune system is weakened, such as after surgery, this is a reservoir of MRSA that can attack you. For this reason, some, but not all hospitals, are giving patients with upcoming surgery a simple nasal spray antibiotic that is specific for MRSA.
So if you expect surgery, be sure to ask beforehand if you will get a nasal spray prophylaxis for MRSA. If they say “no”, or they don’t know what you mean, discuss it with them.
Each year, over 100,000 Americans get MRSA infections, so this is not just a frivolous worry. The vast majority of these infections are “iatrogenic”, which means that people got them *in* the hospital, while being treated for other problems.
An important part of health care is watching out for your own interests.
Health ping.
actually the term for hospital acquired infections is nosocomial. Iatrogenic means caused by the treatment or error in the treatment and can refer to infections as well as other complications.
One of the things I recommend to folks is to hit the drug store and get some acidopholous.
While it might not directly help against staph, having a good balance in the intestinal flora probably enables the immune system to more aggressively target bad stuff.
One of the things that come up in the health blogs is Beta 1,6 glucan. It is a polysaccharide that is in the cell membranes of yeast. It’s claimed that b16G kicks your immune system into warp speed, because the body has a natural ability from very early on to fight off yeast infections. Yeasts are one of the most ubiquitous - and opportunistic - organisms around, and if your body wasn’t constantly destroying it, you would be totally fermented in a day or two.