News • Infections
UV Light Can Aid Hospitals’ Fight to Wipe Out Drug-Resistant Superbugs
Adding UV light to standard cleaning cut transmission of 4 resistant bacteria by 30 percent
Adding UV light to standard cleaning cut transmission of 4 resistant bacteria by 30 percent
On European Antibiotic Awareness Day (EAAD), the European Public Health Alliance and the European Patients Forum jointly call on the European Commission and national governments to step up the fight against drug-resistant infections in the follow-up EU Action Plan on Antimicrobial Resistance announced for 2017. The EU has a vital role to play in protecting health security in Europe and empowering…
A global spotlight has at last highlighted the truly acute problem of antimicrobial resistance.
Researchers have discovered that secondary infection with the Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) bacterium (or “superbug”) often kills influenza patients because the flu virus alters the antibacterial response of white blood cells, causing them to damage the patients’ lungs instead of destroying the bacterium. The study suggests that inhibiting this response may help treat…
They may be slimy, but they are a perfect environment for microorganisms: biofilms. Protected against external influences, here bacteria can grow undisturbed, and trigger diseases. Scientists at Kiel University, in cooperation with colleagues at the Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH) in Hamburg-Harburg, are researching how it can be possible to prevent the formation of biofilms from the…
Hospital-acquired Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) is on the rise. Symptoms range from non-typical mild diarrhoea that can develop into pseudomembranous colitis up to a toxic megacolon, which often leads to death.
Bacterial infections that don't respond to antibiotics are of rising concern, as is sepsis - the immune system's last-ditch, failed attack on infection that ends up being lethal itself. Reporting online in "Nature", researchers at Boston Children's Hospital describe new potential avenues for controlling both sepsis and the runaway bacterial infections that provoke it.
An international team of including the Lomonosov Moscow State University researchers discovered which enzyme enables Escherichia coli bacterium (E. coli) to breathe.
Data presented at the European Congress of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases diseases has highlighted how a recently-discovered mechanism could mean one of the last-resort antibiotics is under threat. Evidence put before ECCMID suggested the genetic mechanism allowing bacteria to develop and transfer resistance to colistin has been present in several countries around the world –…
Researchers presented findings on the prevalence of the mcr-1 gene, a transferable genetic mechanism of antimicrobial-resistance to colistin - the last resort antibiotic in a number of circumstances. At a session dedicated to late-breaking abstracts on colistin resistance, researchers presented evidence on the prevalence of the gene in bacteria (including Enterobacteriaceae such as Escherichia…
A research team led by University of Arkansas chemist Jingyi Chen and University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences microbiologist Mark Smeltzer has developed an alternative therapeutic approach to fighting antibiotic-resistant infections.
Taking clear pictures of megaenzymes isn’t easy. But it’s definitely worth it. These proteins play an active role in creating many common antibiotics. They are in constant motion, with sections that flip around acrobatically to carry out necessary tasks. Now, for the first time, McGill researchers have been able to take a series of 3D images of a large section from one of these…
Researchers at Duke Health are fine-tuning a test that can determine whether a respiratory illness is caused by infection from a virus or bacteria so that antibiotics can be more precisely prescribed.
Locally applied antibiotics are a component of effective infection management in orthopaedics and trauma surgery. Successful concepts are based on patient-specific surgical and antimicrobial treatment. At the symposium “Infections and high-risk patients: solutions for joint replacements and traumatology” at this year’s Congress on Orthopaedics and Trauma Surgery (DKOU) in Berlin last…
As the World Health Organization (WHO) ramps up its fight against antibiotic resistance, a new multi-country survey shows people are confused about this major threat to public health and do not understand how to prevent it from growing.
Researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences have found that the breast cancer drug tamoxifen gives white blood cells a boost, better enabling them to respond to, ensnare and kill bacteria in laboratory experiments. Tamoxifen treatment in mice also enhances clearance of the antibiotic-resistant bacterial pathogen…
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Within 15 years effective antibiotics will run out and, far from being an apocalyptic fantasy, a world in which common infections and minor injuries can kill is a very real possibility for the 21st Century. Geoff Sussman, one of the world’s foremost wound experts has warned that antibiotic resistance is posing the biggest single threat to global health. Report: Mark Nicholls
Taking antibiotics may increase the risk that a child will develop juvenile arthritis, according to a study from Rutgers University, University of Pennsylvania and Nemours A.I. duPont Hospital for Children published today in Pediatrics.
About 6-8% of Spanish patients will develop an infection during or after a hospital stay. Can these infections be avoided? How is Spain facing up to the challenge? Dr Juan Pablo Horcajada, Head of the Department of Infectious Diseases at Hospital del Mar, Barcelona, and spokesperson of the Spanish Society of Infectious Diseases and Clinical Microbiology (SEIMC), assessed the situation and…
Health always has a political dimension, as seen at two recent international events - the World Health Summit in Geneva in May and the G7 Summit in the Bavarian Alps near Garmisch at the beginning of June. Report: Anja Behringer
Surveillance, hygiene and infection prevention, antimicrobial stewardship, diagnosis of infectious diseases, use of antimicrobial medicines as well as reporting and information. Report: Michael Krassnitzer
Since 2009, as part of diagnostic and antimicrobial stewardship strategies, Hampshire Hospitals National Health Service (NHS) Trust has used serum procalcitonin (PCT) – an innovative and highly specific marker to diagnose clinically relevant bacterial infections and sepsis. Report: Mark Nicholls
Researchers at the University of Toronto design diagnostic chip to reduce testing time from days to one hour, allowing doctors to pick the right antibiotic the first time.
Prescribing antibiotics for a viral infection with fever, a cold and a cough? There is no point! This is the best-known example of over-use in medicine. There are also numerous examples of diagnostic procedures and therapies that are pointless, yet still being doled out in surgeries and hospitals – sometimes even harming a patient. This is set to change, according to the German Society of…