Meticillin-Resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA)

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LITERATURE REVIEW
MRSA (Meticillin-Resistant staphylococcus aureus) is a bacterial infection that infected different parts of the body, for example, the nares and throats, skin as well as wounds. It carried in the nares of 30% of healthy adults. In hospitalized patients, this infection can colonize different parts of the body, depending on the site infection, it can be mild such as having sores or boils on the skin or life threatening, like blood poisoning. It is also known as a superbug due to the fact that it becomes resistant to the antibiotics commonly used to treat ordinary staphylococcus infections. It can be classified as community acquired or health care acquired infection where the latter is becoming the important cause of infection. It is transmitted directly from person to person by direct contact with the skin, clothing or the surrounding area that had recent physical contact with the infected person. In the hospital, it can be found in catheter like urinary as well as feeding tube, or surgical wounds. MRSA can be diagnosed by culture and antibiotic sensitivity by taking a sample of swab from the infected area. If the bacteria grows, different antibiotic swill be used to treat the bacteria to see if the bacteria develop any resistance or sensitivity to antibiotic.
With current practice right now in the ICU settings, when a patient is newly admitted and before any surgical procedures, patients will be screened for MRSA infections. Since 2008, in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia, it was noted that the number of MRSA cases are increasing according to the policy established by the infection control nationwide that requires every patients to be MRSA screen systematically prior to admission. Specimen sample will be ta...

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... drug dosage pertaining to the antibiotic being used to treat MRSA. Patients with MRSA infection prior to being admitted had a higher rate of longer hospitalization and were probably on antimicrobial therapy (Crossley et al and Hershow et al). The proof between the use of previous antibiotic and colonization or infection related to the antibiotic resistance pathogen has been reported for various pathogens including vancomycin-resistant enterococci. The use of excessive antibiotic therapy are frequently unnecessary to prevent nosocomial MRSA and VRE infection (Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA) guidelines, 2003). Studies revealed that countries that have higher rate of antibiotic used often accompanied with a higher incidence of MRSA, which suggested that poor quality infection control is not the only factor that contributes to this epidemic.

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