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December 4, 2008 4:27:13 PM CST

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Screening Isn't Slowing Staph: Study

Posted Mar 12, 08 11:09 AM CDT in Science & Health 

(Newser) – Widespread screening of hospital patients for the drug-resistant staph bacteria MRSA doesn’t appear to reduce the number of infections, a new study finds. Swiss researchers screened more than 10,000 patients for the superbug when they were admitted to the University of Geneva Hospitals. Another 10,000 weren’t tested. The rates of MRSA infections were similar for both groups, the Chicago Tribune reports. 

“It wasn’t what we expected,” the study’s lead author says. Experts are split on the best strategy for fighting the superbug, which is killing almost 19,000 people a year; Illinois passed a law last year requiring hospitals to test all at-risk patients. The study’s lead author suggests targeted testing for high-risk patients: “It’s not cost-effective to do very widespread, universal screening.”

Source Chicago Tribune

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A new study finds that widespread screening of patients for the superbug MRSA is not the best way to address the growing epidemic.   (KRT Photos)
Fred Bledsoe, of Fort Wayne, Indiana, holds a vial of the bacteriophage. His staph infection was treated in the former Soviet Union's Republic of Georgia.   (KRT Photos)
Jeanine Thomas, a survivor of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, stands outside of her Willowbrook, Ill. home in October. Thomas, 52, nearly died a few years ago from a staph infection that...   (Associated Press)
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infection • epidemic • antibiotics • superbug • staph infections • MRSA • epidemiology • JAMA • drug-resistant bacteria


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