Staph Infections in the Elderly?

Question by countrymebe: staph infections in the elderly?
84 year old alzeimers victim for 30+years with staph infection.

Best answer:

Answer by curiousgeorgey
If he/she is in a nursing home or hospital he could have got it from there.

Answer by maxfr8
A bacteria that can fend off one of the most powerful antibiotics — the last pharmaceutical line of defense — has appeared in the United States. The rare strain, Staphylococcus aureus, was first identified in Japan.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Thursday that a Michigan dialysis patient infected with Staphylococcus aureus was not responding completely to the drug vancomycin. The germ showed an intermediate level of resistance to the drug, which is one step away from immunity, officials said.

The patient now is being treated with a combination of drugs, including vancomycin.

This tougher strain of staph was already difficult to treat. Doctors are now worried no treatment will be available for those infected with the deadly bacteria.

Those most at risk are the elderly, those with weak immune systems, hospital patients, newborns and patients with chronic diseases.

But Dr. William Jarvis, a medical epidemiologist with the CDC, said the new strain is rare. “The majority of people aren’t going to be in danger of getting this.”

The evolution of resistance to antibiotics is inevitable, as bacteria grow and reproduce. “The cell wall has become much thicker,” Jarvis said. “As a result, it is much more difficult for the antibiotic to go across that cell wall and get inside the cell” to kill the organism.

Staph bacteria are the No. 1 cause of hospital infections. They are blamed for about 13 percent of the nation’s 2 million hospital infections each year, according to the CDC. Overall, the 2 million infections kill 60,000 to 80,000 people.

A recent study shows people with weakened immune systems are more likely to develop a deadly staph infection.

Researchers from Michigan State University tested 250 people who suffered from an invasive Staphylococcus aureus, or “staph”, infection. Results show patients on hemodialysis are 257-times more likely to contract the infection. Others at risk include those infected with HIV, organ transplant recipients, and cancer patients.

Researchers also found elderly patients, as well as those with hypertension, renal failure, and diabetes, are more likely to die from a staph infection.

This was the first time a study was able to accurately identify exactly who is at risk for developing staph infections. H. Dele Davies, chairperson of MSU’s Department of Pediatrics, says doctors are now able to target these individuals for treatment and therapy.

Davies says, “Prevention is key, of course, but so is recognition by physicians — knowing who is at risk and how to handle these patients.”

Staph infections are very common. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports more than 2 million hospital patients in the United States contract an infection every year.

Health care professionals take a culture from an infected site to determine if it is a staph infection. Once it has been diagnosed as staph, antibiotics are prescribed to target the bacteria. These antibiotics typically kill the infection within a week or two. However, some patients resist the antibiotics.

A vaccine for staph is now being tested. Davies says the study he participated in is important because it helps doctors determine who should be vaccinated.

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