Flesh-eating germ kills woman in three days

It seems as many as 12 people die of this a year in north carolina.

www.msnbc.msn.com...

Good find. Beat me to it.

...There is more to this story.

New diseases are appearing with regularity - and many once benign diseases are becoming virulent and deadly. The "flesh-eating disease" called methicillin resistant staph (MRSA) is one of these.

Once restricted to hospitals, MRSA now is loose in the world and can be "community-acquired." 60% to 75% of all community-acquired staph infections are now methicillin-resistant MRSA.

Of nearly 400 cases of community-acquired staph infections of skin and soft-tissue documented during a three-month period at a local inner-city hospital, 72% were methicillin-resistant, reported Henry M. Blumberg, M.D., of Emory here.

But in 65% of those cases, patients were treated with antibiotics that lacked effectiveness against MRSA, indicating that physicians didn't suspect MRSA and failed to appreciate how widespread it had become in community-acquired settings, Dr. Blumberg and colleagues said in the March 7 issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine.

...our data indicate that community-acquired MRSA has now become a widespread and endemic cause of S. aureus skin and soft tissue infection in our community," the authors said. ..."The proliferation of community-acquired MRSA and especially the USA 300 clone, in the United States has been truly remarkable," Dr. Moellering wrote. "In other parts of the United States, 60% to 75% of all community-acquired isolates of S. aureus are now methicillin-resistant."

Vigilance Urged for Community-Acquired MRSA

More from your lead story:

Flesh-eating germ kills woman in three days

North Carolina nursing assistant cut her finger on a wheelchair

North Carolina health officials are investigating the death of a woman who died last week of a flesh-eating bacteria three days after accidentally jamming her hand in a wheelchair while working at a nursing home.

Nursing assistant Sharron Bishop, 44, died Feb. 27. A doctor said a rare flesh-eating bacteria may have entered her body through a thumb injury and she turned from healthy to fatally ill.

David Bishop said doctors at UNC Hospitals, where Sharron Bishop died, have told him it's impossible to know how his wife contracted the rare infection.

"The UNC doctors said she could have picked it up at the gas station, at the grocery store, anywhere," he said. "We will never know."

My only experience with necrotizing fascitis is in relation to spider bites, but it looks like the infections follow the same course regardless of how you came by the nasty condition.

This is, probably, the worst infection there is, of any kind. Whether strep causes it, or a brown recluse, the results are not pretty. It hurts. A lot.

As I understand it, there's only a couple of options. I think amputation of muscle and tissue from around the site of the decay is the most common procedure, but I've also heard leeches can be used to stop the progression and start the blood flowing back into the area.

The rates are rising fast in America, no? Have they tried cauterization or electro-shock therapy at the wound site? I'm wondering if positive results could be had with forms of treatment besides the butchery so common in these cases. What about operating to cut the flow of blood from the infected region back into the body, and then following that with transfusions?

It's pretty horrible, every time I read about a case of this, it seems like someone's losing a few limbs and then dies anyway. There's gotta be a better way, right? I'm really not qualified to come up with treatments for anything, nevermind this big nasty, but I feel like there have to be options we're not exploring.

[edit on 11-3-2006 by WyrdeOne]

Originally posted by WyrdeOne
Have they tried cauterization or electro-shock therapy at the wound site? I'm wondering if positive results could be had with forms of treatment besides the butchery so common in these cases. What about operating to cut the flow of blood from the infected region back into the body, and then following that with transfusions?

I think the big problem with even attempting alternative treatment is there is just no time. Once you get this it seems to spread like wildfire. Personally, if it can overtake your body in 3 days, I think I'd opt for amputation immediately. Seems the longer they wait to cut it out the less likely they are to get all of it.

Surely though, they must be attempting to study this somewhere.

The real problem is the cover-up. Authorities are minimizing the spread and severity of the problem to prevent public panic.

As a result, many doctors do not realize that community-acquired MRSA is a public health problem - so they don't consider it and diagnose it until it's too late. As relentless points out, the real problem is that it kills so quickly - time is of the essence.

Immediate diagnosis with appropriate treatment is needed - and usually works. See above: "Vigilance Urged for Community-Acquired MRSA."


.

MRSA is so called due to the Staph A becoming resistant to the antibiotic Methicilin.
It can be treated very easily by the stronger anti-biotic vancomycin.

MRSA is in no way shape and form harmful to healthy adults, but is a problem to those who are under going surgical procedures due the breaking of the skind natural barrier defences. ( Alexander, Fawcett, Runciman.Nursing Practise Hospital and Home.)

This women suffered from a bactirium that is much more efficient at invading the body, and in cases death has occoured within 18 hours. here is a UK Goverment page dealing with the disease.

www.moh.gov.sg...

A very very nasty bug. Please remember that it is different to MRSA in symptoms and speed of tissue destruction and treatment. Death occures due to the speed that it destroys tissue in the body and henceforth doesn't give a good diagnosis / treatment window. Once the tissue destruction starts, the ONLY way to remove it is by surgical debridment , and the patient is then treated with strong antiobiotics as a precaution after the operation.

MRSA is treatable just with strong anti biotics - NF is only treatable by surgical intervention.




[edit on 11-3-2006 by MadGreebo]

I am a first responder, and I tell you what this stuff scares the crap out of me. Sometimes a scene can have so much bood you want to pass out when you see it, and there is no way in that enviroment can you have effective body substance isolation.

You go on an accident scene where the victim has this infection and you are bound to get it. Scary stuff.

LoneGunMan, NF has to penetrate the barriers of the skin before you can become infected - We wear goggles, face shields and gloves over long sleeved protective gowns if we have to deal with NF patients - Pity you as a first responder you cannot do that...imagine the panic it would cause......!

All I will say to every one is don't panic. This is very very rare, and as long as you have no open wounds or get fluids in your eyes / mucousal membranes you'll be ok. I just feel really sorry for the women involved - Here in the UK once they start surgical removal of parts because of NF, they actually have to leave the wounds open until they know for 100% certain that they have all the infection out...

You're right MadGreebo - my bad.

I've written about this before when I was more awake.

...Much has happened, biologically, in the 8 years since 1997. For example, Super Bugs are now an everyday reality. In March of 2005, the chief of infectious diseases at Montreal's Jewish General Hospital, Dr. Mark Miller, had this to say:

"Something happened 18 to 24 months ago, ...Now it seems any antibiotic can bring on the disease."

"Super Bugs" are highly contagious and lethal bacteria. They can't be treated with antibiotics.

In fact, antibiotics now cause previously benign bacteria to mutate into lethal forms. Most "Super Bugs" mutate into highly contagious and lethal forms on exposure to antibiotics inside the host's body.

By the end of 2004, five lethal and virulent super bugs were recognized in North America - Clostridium difficile, methycillin resistant staph (MRSA), VRE, flesh eating disease (necrotizing fasciitis), and ESBL-producing bacteria. In addition, several common chronic debilitating infections fall under the VRE and ESBL categories. These diseases once were strictly hospital infections, but no more. Now they are out in the world.

Many, many more super bugs exist that are not fatal - they cause chronic debilitation and disability - but they are not talked about publicly, to prevent "panic," and protect the economy.


....The link above leads to several CBC articles on the big 5 new Super Bugs.

More from your lead story:

Flesh-eating germ kills woman in three days

North Carolina nursing assistant cut her finger on a wheelchair

North Carolina health officials are investigating the death of a woman who died last week of a flesh-eating bacteria three days after accidentally jamming her hand in a wheelchair while working at a nursing home.

Nursing assistant Sharron Bishop, 44, died Feb. 27. A doctor said a rare flesh-eating bacteria may have entered her body through a thumb injury and she turned from healthy to fatally ill.

David Bishop said doctors at UNC Hospitals, where Sharron Bishop died, have told him it's impossible to know how his wife contracted the rare infection.

"The UNC doctors said she could have picked it up at the gas station, at the grocery store, anywhere," he said. "We will never know."

I feel very sad for this women and her family.

By simply bagging her finger/limb in a plastic bag and sealing it and pumping ozone into it would have killed the MRSA bug.

She would be alive and a child would not grow up to be an orphan.







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