Here is an article presenting the new guidelines that the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has just released. In healthcare settings, it has been found that there are a growing number of bacteria that have grown resistant to efforts that seek to control them. As a result the susceptible patients to this bacteria in hospitals incur infections that are often difficult to treat. These increasing drug resistant cases have alerted the Center for Disease Control and Prevention to improve on infection control measures.
The CDC has advised hospitals and other healthcare facilities to make infection control a priority and to be belligerent in taking efforts to reduce the growing rates of drug resistant infection cases that sometimes can be fatal to immunocompromised individuals.
Bacteria has a way of adapting to the environment, that after a number of years, some strains may be found to be resistant to medication that are aimed to kill them. This article cites Staphylococcus aureus as an example. “Staph” is a common bacteria that is found on the skin and mucus membranes, and usually does not cause disease in healthy people. But in immunocompromised individuals, may cause infection and even death. Only 2 percent of this bacteria were drug resistant in 1972. By 2004, it was found that an overwhelming 63 percent of the strains of Staphylococcus aureus were drug resistant to antibiotics used to eradicate them. Resistant strains like Methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus is such a problem in hospitals and healthcare facilities like nursing homes and dialysis centers that in some cases, no available antibiotic can be found to treat them.
The director of the CDC’s Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion, Dr. Denise Cardo, stresses that effective prevention is key to minimizing the effects of drug resistant bacteria infections and enhancing patient safety. These facilities should be constant and diligent in carrying out infection control measures.
The guidelines are entitled Management of Multidrug-Resistant Organisms in Healthcare Settings, and was developed by experts who are internationally celebrated. They coordinated with the CDC’s Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC) to tailor the infection control strategies for the prevention of such drug resistant cases in the health care facilities of the United States.
Nosocomial infections, like Staphylococcus aureus and MRSA infections are acquired in the hospital, where the patient’s immune system is likely to be suppressed, making him or her prone to infections. The guidelines exemplify control strategies such as making infection control programs a priority by adequate funding and staffing, cautiously keeping up to date with infection rates, proper training and implementation of infection control measures by staff, and devising a customized prevention program for their hospital or healthcare facility.
If drug resistant cases do not improve, hospitals and healthcare facilities should reevaluate and apply more rigid infection control measures. They should take into consideration hiring specialized professionals to give them a fresh view on things and to determine what is lacking in the system and recommend solutions. As long as infection control is kept a priority, and diligent strategies are implemented, the cases of drug resistant infections should decline.

ORIGINAL TEXT:
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) today released new guidelines outlining strategies to prevent the spread of drug-resistant infections in healthcare settings. The new guidelines seek to halt the rising rates of drug-resistant infections by calling on hospitals and other healthcare facilities to make comprehensive infection control programs a priority and to take aggressive steps to reduces rates of drug resistance.
During the past 30 years, the proportion of bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics has steeply risen. Antimicrobial resistance occurs when bacteria change or adapt in a way that allows them to survive in the presence of antibiotics designed to kill them. A good example is the type of bacteria that cause “staph” infections– Staphylococcus aureus. In 1972, only 2 percent of these types of bacteria were drug resistant. By 2004, 63 percent of these types of bacteria had become resistant to the antibiotics commonly used to treat them, and methicillin-resistant “staph” infections, often referred to as MRSA, are a growing problem in hospitals and healthcare facilities such as nursing homes and dialysis centers. In a few cases, bacteria become so resistant that no available antibiotics are effective against them.
“Effective and comprehensive programs to prevent drug-resistant infections are essential to improve patient safety,” said Dr. Denise Cardo, director of CDC’s Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion. “Preventing these types of infections requires a constant and concerted effort on the part of healthcare facilities, but it’s important they make this a priority. We need to reduce the number of these serious and potentially life-threatening infections-doing so helps patients get healthy and, most importantly, saves lives.”
This new guidance, Management of Multidrug-Resistant Organisms in Healthcare Settings, was developed by internationally recognized experts in infection control in conjunction with CDC’s Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC), a committee comprised of external advisors from academic research institutions, public health and healthcare organizations to advise CDC regarding infection control, strategies for healthcare surveillance and prevention of healthcare-associated infections in the United States.
Staph infections, including MRSA, occur most frequently among persons in hospitals and healthcare facilities who have weakened immune systems, and often result in bloodstream infections, surgical site infections or pneumonia.
The new guidelines illustrate that in order to prevent and control antibiotic-resistant infections, hospitals and healthcare facilities need to take several steps including:
• Ensuring prevention programs are funded and adequately staffed,
• Carefully tracking infection rates and related data to monitor the impact of prevention efforts,
• Ensuring that staff use standard infection control practices and follow guidelines regarding the correct use of antibiotics,
• Promoting best-practices with health education campaigns to increase adherence to established recommendations,
• Designing robust prevention programs customized to specific settings and local needs
If those recommendations don’t improve rates, healthcare facilities must reevaluate and implement more stringent measures, including screening of all patients at high risk for carrying drug-resistant bacteria to make sure the correct precautions are used for the right patients.
“There’s no one size fits all solution,” said Dr. Patrick J. Brennan, chair of CDC’s Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee. “Prevention of drug-resistant infections requires a full complement of actions tailored to the local setting.”
CDC continues to work with local and regional partners to evaluate effective strategies to reduce healthcare-associated infections. The full document and more information on CDC and local efforts to reduce healthcare-associated infections can be found at www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dhqp. Read more