Staphylococcuss: Treatment, Diagnosis and Prevention



Staphylococcuss


What are Staphylococcuss?


Staphylococcuss

What is Staphylococcuss
Staphylococcus is a group of bacteria that can cause a number of diseases as a result of infection of various tissues of the body. Staphylococcus is more familiarly known as staph (pronounced "staff"). Staph-related illness can range from mild and requiring no treatment to severe and potentially fatal.
Staphylococcus aureus is a type of bacteria. It stains Gram positive and is non-moving small round shaped or non-motile cocci. It is found in grape-like (staphylo-) clusters. This is why it is called Staphylococcus.

Causes of Staphylococcuss
Staph infections may cause disease due to direct infection or due to the production of toxins by the bacteria. Boils, impetigo, food poisoning, cellulitis, and toxic shock syndrome are all examples of diseases that can be caused by Staphylococcus.




Preventing staph infections
You can reduce your chances of developing staph infections by:

If you experience repeated staph infections and you're found to carry the bacteria on your skin, your doctor may recommend using antibacterial shampoo and nasal cream to kill the bacteria and reduce the risk of further infections.



Symptoms/Signs of Staphylococcuss
Staph infections can range from minor skin problems to endocarditis, a life-threatening infection of the inner lining of your heart (endocardium). As a result, signs and symptoms of staph infections vary widely, depending on the location and severity of the infection.

Symptoms of Staph Infection
There are many different forms of staph infections, and each has different symptoms. The most common are:

Skin Infections: These staph-related conditions include boils, cellulitis, and impetigo.
Boils are hair follicles or oil glands that have become infected and are often filled with pus. The boil may be raised, swollen, red, and painful to the touch.
Boils most often occur in areas with a lot of friction, including under the arms, in the groin, and on the buttocks.

Cellulitis is an infection of the deeper layers of skin that causes your skin to swell, turn red, and become warm and tender.
Oozing sores (ulcers) may also develop. Cellulitis most often occurs in the lower legs and feet.
Impetigo is a highly contagious skin rash most commonly seen in children. An infected person will have blisters that ooze and crust over after a few days.



Food poisoning: Eating food that has been contaminated by staph bacteria is one of the most common causes of food poisoning.
Toxic shock syndrome: Also known as TSS, this potentially deadly condition results from toxins that are produced by some strains of staph bacteria.
TSS has been associated with the use of certain types of tampons, skin wounds, and surgery.

Septic Arthritis: Staph infection is a common cause of septic arthritis. The knees are most often affected, but the bacteria can target other joints including your ankle, hip, wrist, elbow, shoulder, or spine.

Bacteremia: Also known as blood poisoning, bacteremia is a more serious result of staph infection.
As the name suggests, it occurs when staph bacteria enter a person's bloodstream. Bacteremia can affect:



Types of staph infections
Staphylococcus aureus infections range from mild to life threatening. The bacteria tend to infect the skin (see Overview of Bacterial Skin Infections), often causing abscesses. However, the bacteria can travel through the bloodstream (called bacteremia) and infect almost any site in the body, particularly heart valves ( endocarditis) and bones ( osteomyelitis). The bacteria also tend to accumulate on medical devices in the body, such as artificial heart valves or joints, heart pacemakers, and catheters inserted through the skin into blood vessels.
Certain staphylococcal infections are more likely in certain situations:

Endocarditis: When people inject illegal drugs, have an infected blood vessel catheter, or have an artificial heart valve

Osteomyelitis: If Staphylococcus aureus spreads to the bone from infection in the bloodstream or from infection in adjacent soft tissue, as may occur in people with deep pressure sores or foot sores due to diabetes
Lung infection (pneumonia): When people have had influenza (particularly) or a bloodstream infection, when people are taking corticosteroids or drugs that suppress the immune system (immunosuppressants), or when they are hospitalized because they need tracheal intubation and mechanical ventilation (see Hospital-Acquired and Health Care–Associated Pneumonia)
There are many strains of Staphylococcus aureus. Some strains produce toxins that can cause the symptoms of staphylococcal food poisoning, toxic shock syndrome, and scalded skin syndrome.


Staphylococcuss



Risk factors for staph infections
Certain conditions increase the risk of getting a staphylococcal infection:

 A transplanted organ, an implanted medical device, or a catheter inserted into a blood vessel for a long time



How to diagnose Staphylococcuss
Steps in diagnosis of S. aureus infections include:
Collection of specimens
This depends on the area of the body affected. For example, those with a skin infections or throat, nostrils and wound infections need to swabbed for pus and other discharge with the bacteria. Swabs consist of a sterile absorbent cotton tipped sticks. Those with a urinary tract infection need to provide a urine samples in sterile containers and those with a generalized blood infection need to provide blood samples. Blood samples are then transferred to blood culture bottle.

Identification of the bacteria
A small portion of the sample is swabbed onto a glass slide. This is then stained with Gram stain or dyes like crystal violet and basic fuschin and viewed under the microscope. S. aureus is Gram positive and stains blue or purple and appears as small round cocci or short chains and most commonly as grape-like clusters. Since S. aureus may be normally present on skin and mucous membranes, this test is not always confirmatory.



Confirmation of diagnosis
To confirm a diagnosis, the sample from the patient is placed onto a culture media. This could be a liquid or gel that provides sources of nutrition, carbon, energy and nitrogen for the bacteria to grow. For S. aureus, the medium used is suffused with blood and lactose. Also commonly used is the mannitol salt agar, which is a selective medium with 7–9% salt or sodium chloride that allows S. aureus to grow selectively. These media are placed on petri dishes and swabbed with the sample. The dishes are then incubated overnight at 37 degrees Celsius. After a set period of time the typical golden colonies of S. aureus are seen. These are then stained with Gram stain for confirmation and also undergo specific characteristic tests like the catalase test or the coagulase test for diagnosis.

Rapid diagnostic tests
These help in detection of the bacteria in real-time. These techniques include Real-time PCR and Quantitative PCR and are increasingly being employed in clinical laboratories.

Identification of toxins
This is important for more severe cases like toxic shock syndrome and food poisoning. Toxins produced by S. aureus, such as enterotoxins A to D and TSST-1 may be identified using agglutination tests. The tests are determined by clumping of the latex particles by the toxins present in the samples.



Antimicrobial assay studies
Many of the S. aureus strains are resistant to antibiotics. These assay studies help determine the specific susceptibility to antibiotics of the infected strain. Antibiotics like penicillin, amoxicillin, methicillin, first-generation cephalosporins, bactrim and vancomycin are commonly tested.

How to Prevent Staphylococcuss



Staphylococcuss

Treatment for Staphylococcuss
Antibiotics commonly prescribed to treat staph infections include certain cephalosporins, nafcillin or related antibiotics, sulfa drugs or vancomycin. Vancomycin increasingly is required to treat serious staph infections because so many strains of staph bacteria have become resistant to other traditional medicines.

 Antibiotic resistance of S. aureus

S. aureus strains may become resistant to penicillin by producing enzymes like penicillinase that destroys the antibiotic. This is a form of β-lactamase which breaks down the β-lactam ring of the penicillin molecule. To overcome this molecules resistant to penicillinase have been developed. These include:



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