Mrsa

Nurses General Nursing

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could you please tell me more about mrsa? is this really so dangerous, so contagious? what is the incubation period?

i apologize for posting on this forum as i am not a nurse yet, i am pre-nursing student. this is not my home work...i was in contact with somebody who has mrsa, and that person made me touch the skin around the abscess. at that time, i did not know that person has a mrsa. now i am afraid i might get it, or even worse, bring it home to my kids.

thank you!

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Specializes in Developmental Disabilities, LTC.

I'm curious about this, too. I worked in a facility as a CNA with all kinds of MRSA patients.

It never seemed like a big deal to me. I was one little boy's primary care giver & had to apply ointment to the skin surrounding his g-tube stoma every night, which I often did without gloves (I know - naughty, naughty:nono:). Months after he came to stay with us, it was revealed that he had MRSA in his stoma. And I seem to remember a nurse saying that I had probably contracted it, but then again, we probably all had.

I just don't get it. Some folks would stay with us & we were told that they had MRSA in their groin, urine, armpit, groin. I asked a nurse about treatment once & she told me that MRSA was fairly treatable, but that our facility's policy was to not treat the MRSA - which made sense to me, since none of the residents appeared to have any symptoms.

Is it deadly, or harmless, or is it harmless in some people, but can become lethal in others?

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Specializes in Hospital Education Coordinator.

It is very contagious. That is why standard precautions are so important. You never really know who is infected. You can find more info at the CDC website.

www.cdc.gov

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I did wash my hands right after I thouched her skin. I read somewhere that the incubation time is 4-10 days.

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According to the experts, about one-third of the population has the bacteria on the skin, most without even knowing it.

I work in a prison. Of course the inmates are always in close contact with each other, always coming in contact with everything that everyone else has touched. A few get the infection while others do not. It's not just the weak or sickly that get the infection, but this one and that one, so to speak.

It's an intense infection, sometimes causing significant pain, swelling, abscessing, and can produce copious amounts of drainage. The dozens of infections I have seen have been treated with Bactrim and some cleaning techniques. All have healed.

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Specializes in ICU.

I used to work on a vascular ward (2000 - 2002) and although we had a few patients with MRSA I don't recall any of the staff contracting it. I then worked on an adjoining ward where they had a higher incidence of MRSA and all the staff were tested. I think a couple of staff tested positive and they were treated.

I have only heard of one nurse since then getting MRSA and that was in his lip (split skin and he got trachy splat on it :uhoh21:.

I think if you wash your hands frequently, wear gloves and use disposable aprons whenever you do any procedures (and of course wash hands before and after) you can minimise the risk.

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Specializes in Advanced Practice, surgery.

Hand washing is key to the prevention of any infection and MRSA is no different. THere are many people who are colonised in the community, the problems in hospitals is our patients have wounds and are susceptible to infection which is when it will cause a problem.

Hand washing, hand washing hand washing :D

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Specializes in ICU.
Hand washing is key to the prevention of any infection and MRSA is no different. THere are many people who are colonised in the community, the problems in hospitals is our patients have wounds and are susceptible to infection which is when it will cause a problem.

Hand washing, hand washing hand washing :D

We recently had our soap changed and now quite a lot of the staff have sore chapped hands. So do a couple of the wards (I work in ICU). Infection Control don't believe the soap is to blame because most of the wards are not affected. Personally I think the fact that those wards are not affected indicates they don't wash their hands enough.

:sasq:

This is what I would just love to do to people that don't wash their hands :D

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Specializes in Advanced Practice, surgery.
We recently had our soap changed and now quite a lot of the staff have sore chapped hands. So do a couple of the wards (I work in ICU). Infection Control don't believe the soap is to blame because most of the wards are not affected. Personally I think the fact that those wards are not affected indicates they don't wash their hands enough.

:sasq:

This is what I would just love to do to people that don't wash their hands :D

we did a hand washing audit, I sat quietly in the corner of a ward and logged every person that came in and how many used any hand hygine. The results were really scary

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