Why People Catch MRSA in the Hospital

Why People Catch MRSA in the Hospital

MRSA (Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus), a potentially deadly infectious bacteria, lives in many of our noses and we don’t even know it. As long as we have a healthy immune systems, they can live in our noses and on our skin undetected for years. Because of drug resistance MRSA is very hard to treat. Thirty seven thousand people died in the United States last year in the United States  from MRSA.

When someone gets a cut or skin abrasion, MRSA. This can start out as small red bumps and progress into what looks like a spider bite, possibly accompanied by fever or rash. But it quickly it becomes a pus-filled boil that needs to be surgically cleaned out. In a healthy individual that is sometimes all the treatment necessary. MRSA can also spread from the nose down into the respiratory tract and people can get a MRSA urinary tract infection.

No one knows why some people are more resistant to MRSA infections than others. MRSA is not an especially virulent form of Staphylococcus, but it is very difficult to treat because it is resistant to antibiotics. Once it gets into the tissue, it can spread to organs and cause  necrotizing (flesh-eating) and pneumonia.  It can also cause toxic shock syndrome because the bacteria carries a poison.

In some hospitals in the United States, they have started swabbing the noses of employees and visitors to identify MRSA carriers. Thirty percent or more of these people have MRSA in their nose. Eighty-three percent of the people who get a MRSA Infection get the same strain of MRSA that is in their nose. So it is to their advantage to get it treated as well as benefiting the hospital’s patients. Checking patients for MRSA before operations and using bacteriophage nasal spray could reduce the number of MRSA infections.

Privacy curtains in hospital rooms can also be contaminated with MRSA. Some hospitals have started washing the privacy curtains between patients. Another major cause of MRSA infection is people not washing their hands.

However, swabbing of noses, washing privacy curtains, and other MRSA-prevention practices are voluntary policies set by the hospitals themselves, and not employed by all hospitals. I feel that hospitals should be required to report how many people caught MRSA in their hospital, as well as implement and notify consumers of their MRSA-prevention practices. At the very least people should ask about the sanitary policies at a hospital before going for an operation.