Hospitals Could Stop Infections by Tackling Bacteria Patients Bring In, Studies Find

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/07/health/research/07infection.html?ref=science

This article was about bacteria causing infections at hospitals. This article was from the New York Times and was written by Pam Belluck on January 6, 2010. It discussed how doctors can solve the problem of acquiring an infection at a hospital while having surgery. Everyone has millions of bacteria on their body at all times. There is a common bacteria called staphylococcus aureus that many patients can carry before entering a hospital. However, if this bacteria gets into someone's body via an incision, sometimes problems can arise. Dr. Verbrugh carried out a study where he swabbed the noses of patients who were having surgery and were going to be in the hospital for at least five days. He found 500 people who carried staphylococcus aureus and gave them ointment and soap that had antiseptics in it. From this study he found that after surgery the patients were 60 percent less likely to develop an infection. Another study that was done was performed by Dr. Wenzel. He looked at the skin disinfectants that different hospitals use. The most common disinfectant was povidone-iodine, but another one was chlorhexidine-alcohol, which was used in less hospitals. Dr. Wenzel found that the alcohol solution was much more efective at removing harmful or pathogenic bacteria than the iodine one. These two studies were just conducted in the United States.

It is slightly unclear about the author's view or tone in this article. The author does a good job at simply telling us the facts of the studies and what scientists learned from these studies. I think it is obvious that the author believes it is a good idea to try and solve the problem of infections at hospitals. Even though the chlorhexidine-alcohol disinfectant is slightly more expensive than the povidone-iodine, it is necessary to spend that extra money because in the long run if less people are acquiring infections after surgery, then that will save a lot of money. One quote that does a great job at summing up this article is when Dr. Wenzel says, “Everybody wins on this. Patients obviously have less morbidity, and hospitals and medical centers and insurers save a lot of money.” Because the author chose to include this quote it can be implied that she is in favor of using extra precautions to insure less infection. There was not any additional information about Pam Belluck. Belluck was not very biased in this article at all, because she just gave the facts and not her opinion at all. This article was mostly just informative.

I decided to choose this article because we have done an entire unit on microbiology, which includes bacteria. I think it is a very fitting and appropriate article in relation to our class. I remember when we learned about normal bacteria flora and how we all have many bacterial cells living both inside and outside our bodies. The bacteria discussed in the article, staphylococcus aureus, can be a beneficial and a harmful bacteria at the same time. About one third of people carry this bacteria and it does not do them any harm. However, it can be harmful if it develops during surgery at the site of an incision. I think it is great that people are taking the time to address a very important issue, and if hospitals follow through with the findings from the two studies, that would greatly reduce that amount of infections that patients while in hospitals.