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Monday, February 06, 2006AT LEAST 100,000 people admitted to hospital each year are unknowing carriers of the MRSA superbug, putting other patients with open wounds at risk of potentially fatal bloodstream infections, research suggests. ...A study by a Swiss research team, published today in Critical Care, suggests that more comprehensive screening of hospital admissions for MRSA could be greatly enhanced with a molecular test that shortens the time taken to identify carriers by two-thirds to less than a day. The test looks for traces of the bacteria's DNA, rather than spotting evidence of the bugs. If the NHS data available were extrapolated for all 174 acute trusts, they would suggest that nearly 100,000 carriers of MRSA are entering hospital each year. A comprehensive screening strategy would probably push the figure even higher. We know this bacteria is in the community. It would make sense to test for it on admission and to take proper precautions. Of course, hospital personnel should be taking proper precautions anyway to avoid infections with common, sensitive bacteria as well. posted by Sydney on 2/06/2006 08:16:00 AM 1 comments 1 Comments:
I don't know if it would make sense to test for it on admission. We'd have to know what the sensitivity of the test is. Since the UK has rampant MSRA, including in the hospitals, the pretest probability and therefore, the utility of the test is going to be much higher there than here.
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