MRSA Bacteria Present in 6% of Children in Hospital ICUs: Study

A study of children admitted to pediatric intensive care units (PICU) has found that about 6% of the young patients carry colonies of the so-called “super-bug” MRSA, which could lead to severe injuries from hospital infections among other patients or themselves. 

The results of the study, conducted by researchers at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center in Baltimore, Maryland, were published in this month’s issue of the medical journal Emerging Infectious Diseases. The findings come as health experts grow more concerned about the rate of community-acquired hospital infections making their way into medical facilities and infecting other patients.

Researchers looked at 1,674 children admitted to Johns Hopkins PICU from March 1, 2007 through May 31, 2008. They found that 72 of the children (6%) had colonies of community-acquired Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or CA-MRSA, on their bodies.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there are more than 2 million hospital infections acquired each year, resulting in about 90,000 deaths annually. Another 1.5 million long term care and nursing home infections occur every year.

MRSA infections, have accounted for more than 60 percent of hospital staph infections in recent years. The CDC reports that about 126,000 hospital MRSA infections occur each year, resulting in about 5,000 deaths. But some researchers suggest that the number of deaths from MRSA in the U.S. is closer to 20,000 annually.

“These data describe the prevalence of MRSA colonization in patients admitted to the PICU and suggest that CA-MRSA strains may be becoming endemic in hospitalized children,” researchers warned in the study’s results. “Our data show that epidemic CA-MRSA strains are endemic to the PICU. These strains can be transmitted to children in the hospital and can cause invasive hospital-acquired infections.”

The researchers said that the findings add to the body of evidence stressing the growing need for hospitals to screen incoming patients for MRSA colonies in order to prevent hospital-acquired infections.

The findings follow a previous study published in Emerging Infections Diseases last November, when University of New Jersey researchers determined that the community strains now entering hospitals are not replacing hospital strains, but instead are adding to the numbers of people infected, and said that strategies for prevention of infection and treatment of patients needs to be coordinated at the local level.