14 DAY TRIAL // A new study published in today's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine warns US population against the main source for skin infection in America - the staph which also resists to many types of antibiotics. The staph is medically termed as Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and causes skin and soft tissue infection.
Researcher Dr. Gregory Moran, Professor of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, David Geffen School of Medicine, stated: "MRSA is now the most common cause of skin infections in most of the big U.S. Cities. When doctors are deciding if a patient needs antibiotics, they should be given them antibiotics that cover MRSA. That's a change from things we've been doing for a decade. This has changed. A different type of bacteria is now the most common cause of infections."
The dangerous bacteria usually lives in the nose of many people. In some of them, it may live long but cause no trouble, while in others it may lead to the damaging of their health and to severe infections. When active, the MRSA bacteria can infect simple skin lesions or may have other more serious consequences, such as bloodstream infections or infections of the heart valves.
The type of MRSA which usually affects population leads to the appearance on the skin of the patient of swollen pimples. These pimples may also not be swollen, but they are red and cause pain in the patient, presenting also a discharge.
For a long time, the staph was known to occur only in the limited spaces of hospitals and other health care facilities. But for some time now, MRSA has come to also affect people who were not or have not been recently hospitalized. Therefore, the bacteria has come to spread outside hospitals and health care centers.
In the trial, researchers took samples of infected skin or soft tissues from 422 patients hospitalized in 11 cities around the US. They found that 59% of the patients were infected with MRSA. One genetic type of the bacteria (USA300) was found in 97% of the samples, while 74% were a single strain (USA300-0114).
"We weren't surprised that it was the most common bug overall. But we didn't know how uniform it was going to be, and all across the U.S., it was remarkably similar. There's something about this particular strain (USA300) that gives it some survival advantage over other types," Dr. Gregory Moran said.