Today’s blog entry comes from one of our in-house Safety Training and Injury Prevention Specialists, Patrick Brayton. Patrick has over 30 years of professional experience working in construction – and is one of our longest standing employees here at Safety Services.
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MRSA is becoming a workplace problem with increasing frequency. It needs to be taken care of and treated immediately.
What You Need to Know about Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus, commonly known as a “Staph Infection”. Staphylococcus aureus is a normal inhabitant of the skin and mucous membranes in the nose of a healthy human. Infections usually remain localized at the point of entry by host defenses. Surface infections include impetigo, folliculitis, abscesses, boils, and infected lacerations. Staphylococcus aureus, or Staph aureus for short, is a germ (bacteria) usually found on a person’s skin and mucous membranes. It may cause infections on broken skin or wounds.
Methicillin is a type of antibiotic used to treat infections caused by Staph aureus. If Staph aureus is resistant to methicillin it is called methicillin resistant Staph aureus (MRSA). This means that the infection may be more difficult to treat. If someone has a Staph infection there are other antibiotics that can be used. Germs called bacteria may cause infections. Antibiotics are drugs used to treat infections caused by bacteria. Sometimes these drugs will no longer kill the germs. This is called antibiotic drug resistance. MRSA can cause infection or colonization.
An infection means that germs are in the body and make you sick, this usually results in signs and symptoms such as fever, pus from a wound, a high white blood cell count, or pneumonia. Germs can also be in the body, but not make you sick. This is called colonization. People who are colonized will have no signs or symptoms. They feel fine.
How do you know if you have MRSA? Your doctor may order a test sample from your wound, blood, urine, nose, or sputum to be sent to the lab. This test is called a culture. If there is MRSA in the sample, the culture is positive. This means you have MRSA in your body.
Contact with the infected / colonized part of the body usually spreads MRSA. WASH YOUR HANDS: You can distribute it to anything you touch if you do not clean your hands. Hands may be washed with soap and water for ten seconds or sanitized with an alcohol-based cleanser. In some cases MRSA will go away for a time, but then it may come back. At home, in most cases, you only need to use good hand washing. Healthy family members, who do not have large open wounds, skin diseases, or have diabetes, are not likely to get MRSA. When you go to the doctor’s office or to hospital clinic appointments, you should tell the doctors and nurses that you have MRSA, so they can take steps to avoid spreading it to others.
Will I ever get rid of MRSA? – Over time your normal skin organisms may take the place of MRSA. You will no longer be isolated when cultures are negative for MRSA. What will this mean for hospital care? All patients who have a positive culture for MRSA are placed in isolation. Isolation is used to keep from spreading MRSA to other patients. There will be a cart outside the room to hold supplies. A card will be placed on the door to alert everyone to what precautions are needed to enter your room. Hospital staff will wear gowns and gloves to care for you and will sometimes wear a mask. Visitors should report to the nurses’ station for directions on what to do to enter your room. All of these steps are to keep germs from spreading to others. Incubation period: Variable and indefinite, commonly 4-10 days; the disease may not occur until several months after colonization. Mode of transmission: Contact with nasal carriers (30-40% of population); from draining lesions or purulent discharges; and spread person-to-person.
Communicability: As long as purulent lesions continue to drain or carrier state persists; auto-infection may continue for the period of nasal colonization or duration of active lesions.
Survival outside host:
- Organs – up to 42 days;
- Floor – less than 7 days;
- Glass – 46 hours;
- Sunlight – 17 hours;
- UV – 7 hours;
- Meat Products – 60 days;
- Coins – up to 7 days;
- Skin from 30 min to 38 days.
Staphylococcus aureus exhibits resistance to antiseptics and disinfectants, such as quaternary ammonium compounds.
Monitor for skin inflammation if wounded by a sharp instrument; isolate any potential organism from wound or blood.
First aid treatment: In localized skin infections, drain abscesses; see your doctor for antibiotic therapy for severe infections.
Personal hygiene: Wash your hands and shower regularly. Treat any open wounds immediately. Sanitize bathrooms and kitchens.
MRSA prevention and care is one of over 400 prewritten topics authored by the professionals at Safety Services Company. Click Here to request information now.
