STAPH CRISIS IN HOSPITALS:

Would you take your family to eat at a restaurant with a poor health rating posted inside? Probably not. But if you need an operation, do you know which hospitals and surgeons in your area have the lowest infection rates? While many hospitals launch massive marketing campaigns designed to get your business and the money that comes with it, these healthcare providers never advertise the number of patients who contract infections while being treated. The statistics are startling. One out of every twenty hospital patients in the United States gets an infection, totaling two million Americans per year. While some of these infections may be unavoidable, as many as three quarters of these cases are preventable, according to varying estimates. The Centers of Disease Control and Prevention has reported that the best way to reduce infections is for doctors and hospital staff to simply wash their hands between treating patients.

Staphylococcus aureus is very common and is typically found in the nostrils and on the skin of healthy people. Methicillin is an antibiotic similar to penicillin that doctors use to treat staph infections. However, some strains of staph infection have evolved to be resistant to Methicillin, hence the name "Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA)."

The costs of staph infections are high. A typical bloodstream infection can cost around $30,000 to treat. In comparison, the cost of implementing some basic infection control measures is quite low. MRSA and other infections can be virtually eradicated by insisting on basic hand washing, cleaning contaminated equipment like blood pressure cuffs and wheelchairs, and routine testing for and isolation of patients who carry MRSA germ. These precautions have been taken in Holland and Denmark for years, where the percentage of MRSA hospital infections has dropped below 1 percent. In the U.S., where these precautions are rarely taken, around 57 percent of hospital infections are resistant to antibiotic treatment.

So what can you do to safeguard yourself and your loved ones? Insist on hand washing by anyone who touches you in the hospital. Keep a bottle of alcohol based hand sanitizer beside your hospital bed and make people use it. Insist on being told the infection rate for your surgeon and the hospital before undergoing a procedure. Make sure that any I.V. or catheter is necessary for your treatment and is inserted into your body under sterile conditions and regularly checked and changed for cleanliness.