Hospital Patients Get Staph Infections from Their Own Germs.(Brief Article)

2001 JAN 24 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) -- A study shows for the first time that hospital patients often catch life-threatening Staphylococcus infections from germs they harbor in their own noses.

Staph infections are a serious threat to patients in hospitals and nursing homes who are already sick and whose immune systems are weak. Such infections can spread quickly and can be deadly if they enter the bloodstream. Until now, these infections have been blamed largely on germs that spread from person to person, often on people's hands. Experts caution that this is still a common means of transmission.

In the latest study, researchers in Germany looked at two groups of patients with staph blood poisoning (septicemia). In more than 80% of the patients, they found the same strain of Staph. aureus in the blood and the nasal passages of the patients. The nasal tract is a common site for the ordinarily harmless staph bacteria.

That data showed that the patients had infected themselves with their own germs, according to Dr. Christof von Eiff, one of the researchers at the University of Muenster in Germany. It was not clear whether they picked up the bacteria in the hospital or already harbored the bacteria upon admittance, he said.

The study, sponsored by drug maker SmithKline Beecham, was published in the January 4, 2001, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

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