MRSA - what/who to swab!

RE: MRSA - what/who to swab!

Niall Taylor — Fri, 11 Aug 2017 15:26:51 GMT

[quote user="Martin Atkinson"]Why?[/quote]

Because you need someone trained in taking swabs from humans for this purpose - curiosity may not be sufficient reason to do an investigation like this, the results would have to be interpreted in light of the person's medical history. And, yes, I imagine a veterinary lab would be fairly horrified to be receiving swabs from human patients.

Niall

RE: MRSA - what/who to swab!

Martin Atkinson — Fri, 11 Aug 2017 12:42:55 GMT

[quote user="Niall Taylor"]If you are going to get it done it MUST be by an outside agency.[/quote]Why? AFAIA the OP is not concerned about this as a legal issue it is only for their own satisfaction/curiosity. I can however see that a veterinary laboratory may be concerned with receiving human samples due to the (vanishingly small) public health risk.

RE: MRSA - what/who to swab!

Niall Taylor — Fri, 11 Aug 2017 12:38:27 GMT

[quote user="Catriona MacIntyre"]Is anyone in the dog's owners family a healthcare worker?[/quote]

^ This - or do they regularly visit someone in hospital or care-home?

Swabbing members of staff would be counterproductive and confusing as a reasonable % of healthy humans have the MRSA bug at various sites anyway. If you are going to get it done it MUST be by an outside agency.

Niall

RE: MRSA - what/who to swab!

Catriona MacIntyre — Thu, 10 Aug 2017 21:50:55 GMT

Is anyone in the dog's owners family a healthcare worker?

RE: MRSA - what/who to swab!

Rob Loxley — Thu, 10 Aug 2017 15:34:42 GMT

As per reference (Bella moss foundation) above, "Individual cases of resistant infection are likely to be externally acquired. When a cluster of cases appears, the practice should urgently review its sepsis regime."
"Generally, routine screening [of staff] is not helpful if we cannot connect it to a situation in the practice; therefore, unless we have reason to believe that a need exists to screen staff, it will tell us nothing about our practice to undertake it."

[quote user="An On MRCVS"]We were looking at swabbing theatre, prep, kennels and consult rooms[/quote]
If you do decide to do some bacteriological testing Greendale Vet Lab will do the swabs etc, but you are essentially looking at the effectiveness of your hygiene protocols overall rather than just MRSA

RE: MRSA - what/who to swab!

Virginia Campbell — Thu, 10 Aug 2017 13:02:00 GMT

[quote user="An On MRCVS"]Should we look at swabbing staff members[/quote]

Worms, can of. Lots of ifs and buts to do with the science and ethics of this.

Agree Bella Moss foundation is a good starting point.

RE: MRSA - what/who to swab!

Martin Atkinson — Thu, 10 Aug 2017 13:00:13 GMT

We were nasal swabbed several years ago and I cannot for the life of me remember why. I certainly didn't request it and it wasn't suggested because we've had a problem I think it was just a random survey by the local health authority or might have been BVA driven. Maybe your LHA or PHE might be able to help to avoid private lab fees.

Incidentally we've had a few cultures come back as MRSA but the they were still sensitive to most antibiotics - so what's the problem here?!. It sometimes makes me wonder how they define this as the acronym only means it's Methicillin resistant - I always use to think it stood for 'multiply resistant staph. aureus', which makes a lot more sense.

RE: MRSA - what/who to swab!

Utlendigur — Thu, 10 Aug 2017 12:20:25 GMT

What about asking the Bella Moss Foundation?