MRSA Notes

158 responses so far ↓

• Annette // Oct 19, 2006 at 12:22 pm

  My father died nov.2003 from sepsis after spleen surgery at the age of 63 and it was 12 days after surgery.we where aware of all the risks but an infection like this was never mentioned.by the by time the doctors found out just what it was the $10,000 meds. did no good.this is a very serious illness that needs more attention!

• mary marshall // Jan 21, 2007 at 11:42 am

  My husband is in icu fighting for his life from sepis (mrsa) It all started a year ago with hip surgery

• Annette // Jan 21, 2007 at 4:36 pm

  Mary-
  my prayers are with you and your husband for a full recovery!! please stay on top of the doctors as well as the hospital.I don’t know all your details,but I can understand what you must be going through.

• Christina // Jan 23, 2007 at 11:48 am

  Mary - we will sure keep your family in our prayers. Annette - you are so right. Unbelievable to me that this huge risk of hospitalization is so minimized when so many people have suffered and died because of it.

• Kathi // May 8, 2007 at 2:31 pm

  My experience with MRSA followed a near fatal car accident in 2001. After being sent home to recover, the symptoms set in: very high fever, weakness, loss of apetite, severe back pain. Rushed back to hospital and emerg. room discovered multi organ shut-down. Placed on life support for about a month, and family was told nothing more could be done, except prayer. I never knew of nor anyone who had this infection. God did bring me back to Him through this slow and painful recovery (accident caused multiple fractures of femur, most ribs, collarbone, lacerated liver and lacerated spleen. Mary, I will pray for your husband, because only God can cure this infection.

• mary // May 13, 2007 at 12:17 am

  Thank-you for your prayers for my husband. He has been home for about a month now. After the mrsa infection he became very ill from what is called C-diff for short. Its a intestinal infection from all the strong antibiotics (vancomycin)he was on for so long. He was put back in icu again for this and almost had surgery to remove his intestines. I’m emotionally exhausted from all of this. He is still very weak and stays in bed most of the time. I did not know how he survived after going through so much. Your prayers and everyone close to us who prayed made a difference in his recovery. The doctors and nurses who took care of him were great too. Again thank-you–Mary

• Dayle // May 19, 2007 at 9:33 pm

  My dad died of MRSA May 11th, 2007….this is terrible stuff. Why does the general public have so little knowledge about such a dangerous bacteria???
  To all of you who have lost someone to MRSA - - your are in my prayers.

• suzette rizzo // May 26, 2007 at 1:59 am

  My grandfather died on xmas day 2006 after contracting MRSA while in the hospital. His started in his foot as a boil and ended up becoming flesh eating. His foot was purple with a huge hole in it, that smelled horrindus. We spoke with his doctor regarding this and she ignored it for a while and then placed him on vancomycin after when kept complaining. They also would not keep the wound clean or do any wound care except some normal saline and gauze after i pitched a fit. I literally had to stay at the hospital some nights till after midnight until i made sure the dressing was changed. He went to a rehab facility and bascially the same thing, nothing was done. This all started in oct 2006. The only reason he ended up in the hospital was because he had a panic attack. On dec 15th i received a call stating that he seemed confused and was taken back to the hospital, after that i was told that it had gone into his bone and i figure blood to and he was septic at this point. I got him back to normal mind wise, but by then the mrsa had already done its thing and killed him the same day he was to be released. We have a lawyer and are sueing that hospital and doctor, due to neglect. What makes me so mad is that because someone is old they are considered by some drs and heathcare workers to be worthless and to be not correctly treated due to their age. This needs to stop!!!! His dr put that he died due to old age on the death cert, trying to cover her butt.she has been sued before for medical malpractice twice in million dollar cases sick isnt it.

• jerry huddleston // May 26, 2007 at 4:28 pm

  my son has mrsa .he will be 29years of age in july 07 . he has been in two hospices this year 07. nursing homes also.the hospices are worse than the nursing homes.most of the people they hire are from other countries who dont care about the patients, only their paychecks my 1st. cousin passed away this month and buried. i looked at his body and saw he had died from malnutrion. my son is down to 88 pounds because they dont take time to feed him i do my best to go feed him once aday. i pray with others for him.the medical profession (so call) needs dire and immediate retifying .ji have found out about THE IILUMINATI who own and control the WORLD SYSTEMS.they are SATANINST.SEE

• Wendy // May 29, 2007 at 9:53 pm

  I am a 42 year old female who went into the hospital for a routine D&C and hysteroscopy on May 2nd. After the 20 minute procedure I was in severe pain only to find out that my uterus and lower intestine were punctured. On May 4th I had major stomach surgery to repair the above. On May 6th I was rushed to ICU and was diagnosed with MRSA. After 16 days in the hospital (8 of those in ICU) and 14 days on Vancomycin, I am home and healing nicely. I wanted to post a little uplifting note.

• Rhoda // Jun 3, 2007 at 3:21 pm

  Some of you might be interested to know that there is a new clinic located in Lubbock, Texas offering alternative care for MRSA i.e. the maggot treatment in the news so much lately, as well as a less advertised treatment called Phage Therapy. Phage Therapy is basically the use of tiny viruses that feed on MRSA, C Diff and other bacterium without harming human tissue. Phages can be applied directly to a wound or ingested. They also embrace other non antibiotic treatments such as the use of silver wound dressings, bark powder, honey extracts, and others. The Wound Care Clinic was offering treatment of this kind free of charge the last time I knew. For more information you can Google The Wound Care Clinic in Lubbock. There is only one other clinic like this in the world so if you like the idea help me to tell people about it so maybe there will someday be more places offering Phage Therapy!
  http://www.rhoda.mrsastory.com

• Pat // Aug 3, 2007 at 6:12 pm

  My father-in-law contracted C-diff in the hospital following complications from a stroke in Feb. 2007. He lost 62 lbs in two months with this infection and now down to 137 lbs. We thought we had lost him three different times because of this infection. He is now finally healing and getting better after a very long, hard bout with this dangerous infection. I feel for anyone that goes through this horrible illness.

• Yayay // Sep 4, 2007 at 7:26 am

  I also almost died because my OB punctured my intestine and uterus during a D&C. I had sepsis but the Lord Jesus Christ healed me. Praise the Lord!!!

• Anita // Sep 8, 2007 at 3:48 pm

  My Dad died of sepsis in April as a result of MRSA and PCM after hip surgery. I want to hold the culprits at the VA and the nursing home they shuffled him off to for more neglect responsible but need a bulldog of a lawyer to take them on…Is there anyone to help me?

• Lynn // Oct 24, 2007 at 3:26 pm

  My Dad died on January 7th 2007 due to C-Diff Sepsis. He was 89 years old, but had been doing quite well and was mentally as alert and active as a 50 year old. He had been struggling with the effects of long-term diabetes and was facing possible kidney failure but had been holding his own until a week before Christmas 2006 when he began to complain of not feeling well. He was in an assisted living home but did most everything for himself. One night a few days before Christmas the nurse checked in on him in his room (which was the usual routine) and noticed he was not responsive when she called him. He also had a bump on his head with some blood. They took him to the hospital in an ambulance where they checked him out thoroughly. He had been to the hospital two times in the preceding week because he wasn’t feeling well, but the doctor could determine nothing to be wrong with him. I remember him telling me that he thought it strange that he would shake occasionally when he never did in the past. So the hospital checked him out first to see if he was alright mentally since it looked like he might have taken a fall. He was fine. Then they checked all his other systems which proved alright. His kidney doctor said that his kidney function had dropped to the point where he probably needed dialysis. (I thought that might have been the problem) But the dialysis did not really seem to help him. About the third day in the hospital the kidney doctor said his kidneys were improving and I got excited that he would recover and get out of there. However, he developed a fever with chills. They began treating him for a pneumonia. He had had diverticulosis most of his life and took frequent enemas. The hospital refused to give him one and he was angry with them. He was fiesty and angry up till day 3 when the fever set in and then it went from bad to worse in no time. It was not until several days into it that the hospital realized he had a C-Diff infection. They said they could not give him the proper medication to treat it because his other physical problems—diabetes and kidney failure. He was in the hospital almost two weeks and died on January 7th, two weeks before his 89th birthday. I believe my Dad would have stood a good chance to recuperate (even though he was old) if the sepsis had been diagnosed earlier and more aggressive methods used. I agree with the writer who said it is a real shame the way older people are treated like nonentites and problems ignored simply because of their age. But we as a nation no longer cherish life as we once did. We think nothing of ripping a fetus out of its mother’s womb, so it is no wonder we feel justified in ignoring the elderly too. These are just the beginning stages. We can expect much worse in the near future. God’s Word is true, and those of us who know Him personally can see what is coming. (…in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, etc… bottom line, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God!…ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. This is right out of II Timothy Chapter 3. I don’t know about you, but I am excited because I know where I am going to spend eternity. Do you?

• Kirston // Mar 5, 2008 at 3:48 pm

  My dad died of Sepsis on September 27 2007. He went in for a really small surgrey and past away in one week. The word Sepsis was never said to us while he was in the hospital. This is a really bad thing.

• Muirne // Mar 12, 2008 at 7:28 am

  I am still coming to terms with my husband’s recent death 5 days ago (March 7, 2008). My husband was only 55. In Sept.2007 he shattered his left arm in a fall and underwent surgery to rebuild it. A series of major complications requiring numerous hospital stays ensued. One of these was a three week hospital stay for MRSA in January 2008, which entered through the still unhealed wound in his left arm. He survived this bout and we thought we were out of the woods finally but he was hospitalized again in Febuary 2008. My husband had been a vibrant active man who spent every minute he could outdoors working, fishing, hiking, etc… He was now a weak, very ill individual who aged 20 years with the constant onslaught of infections and organ issues. This most recent bout turned out to be Septicemia and my husband was dead within 12 hours of admission to the hospital. I am still awaiting the death certificate but I am told MRSA and Septicemia are the main causes of death. With all of my husband’s newly aquired medical issues and numerous hospital stays (6 between Sept 2007 and March 2008) I would have thought the possibility of Sepsis would have been mentioned. I was so busy watching my husband for signs of ammonia, low Vitamin K, infection in the wound, edema, and other issues, I never even thought of the signs of Sepsis which, in this case, mimicked a stomach virus with low grade fever (99.3), nausea and diarrhea. These are deadly diseases being dealt with and for high risk patients the hospital staff should be very up front and open about the possibilities and ways to minimize contraction.

• Annette // Mar 12, 2008 at 10:33 am

  Muirne~

  I feel so very sorry for you and the recent death of your husband.Things like this should never happen and ALL THE RISKS should be brought to everyones attention when being in a hospital.My father passed over 4 years ago and till this day, we still find it hard to except his cause of death as (SEPSIS)
  which was never mentioned before he had surgery.As you mentioned ,when you are thinking of and worrying about other things that could go wrong, it’s hard to think something such as a terrible infection could claim someones life so quickly.
  I have always said there needs to be more awareness of these infections and these causes and risks. Just to help save one person from the devastation this leaves would be will worth it.

• Tina // Apr 9, 2008 at 10:01 am

  My mom is currently in the hospital with MRSA. We are not sure where she contracted it because she was in a different hospital the prior week with pneumonia. It’s possible she contracted it at that hospital. She had surgery for diverticulitis last Thursday, but her white blood count never came down like it should have post-operatively.

  If you or someone you love is hospitalized and their white blood count stays high (hers was at 21,000 or 21.0 post op), PLEASE demand a blood culture. They take a long time to grow, and in the interim, your body can deteriorate quickly if you have MRSA.

  Mom’s vancomycin seems to be working, but she is not out of the woods yet.

  In my opinion, hospitals are behind the push in the media to try and make the public believe that MRSA is not a hospital problem. They want the public to believe that MRSA is everywhere and that you don’t have to be hospitalized to contract it. I am not buying it. Everyone I know who has contracted it has had a recent hospitalization or clinic visit.

• Karen Zgorliski // Apr 10, 2008 at 10:41 am

  First off I would like to wish you the best on your Mom’s health my she have a full and healthy recovery My Father was sent to the hospital for just a vitamin K shot when the hospital noticed he had fluid on the one lung, after putting a drainage tube in him he ended up with a staph infection because the staff never checked his wound site or they ignored all of the warning signs, It was my mother that noticed there was something wrong after several attempts to have a nurse take her seriously when they finally had him looked at the infection was already getting to advanced. He immediataly was sent to the critical care unit, when everything after that just snowballed. it was an emotional roller coaster ride. My Father ended up with a trach, feeding tube, and on a respirator, what should of been a simple procedure and a one day stay ended up days turning into weeks and weeks turning into months. One infection lead to another then another, cellilitis (staph), then C-Diff, from antibiotics, his feeding tube got infected, his pic lines , his cathater from his dialysis that was in his neck for two long ended up with MRSA in his blood stream. But, if you ask any of this Doctors he had, they will say because he was on dialysis for years and he had to many things against him, age, dialysis, and an irregular heart rate all which he had before he walked in there on his own. He got sick in one hospital but because of insurance, and them saying they did all they can, and because we did not take the option of removing my Dad from all life support the sent him to another facility on January 15, 2008. After doing research on my own on the Internet I found out that what caused my Dads death was really MRSA sepsis, but on the death certificate they just called it Fungamia. as the cause of death. All these infections just took a toll on his body that he just could not fight off. My Father went to the Hospital on November 6, 2007 for what he believed was just routine, to never seeing his home again because he passed away on March 1, 2008. Ever since my Dad’s passing I have been searching for ways to help people be more aware of the damage that these infections can cause and how to prevent them I have even sent letters to both Hospitals that my Dad was in letting them know that there are precautions that they can take and be more aware of them. simply keep checking on the patients wounds, and take all symptoms seriously. Again may God be with your Mom, and you at this time and always. Take care of yourself too.
  Best wishes,
  Karen

• Cathy // Apr 10, 2008 at 11:29 am

  My daughter and our cat have MRSA and neither have been in the hospital. YOU CAN GET THIS!!!!
  It’s horrible that they are not doing public service announcments on this or anything!!!
  I don’t think the doctors are as informned as they should be about this.
  One doctor said to put triple anti-biotic ointment on my daughters arm(wound site) which I found out later you should NEVER do because it’s the wrong antibiotics in it(penicillin based) that do not kill this bacteria it helps it grow more!!!
  Also never use peroxide or alcohol on the
  wounds .
  The National Saftey Council’s 1996 First Aid Pocket Guide states “DO NOT use hydrogen peroxide. It does not kill bacteria, and it adversly affects capillary blood flowand wound healing.” And the Handbook on Nonprescrition Drugs states ethyl alchol “is not a desirable wound antiseptic because it irritates alredy damaed tissue. The coagulum(crust) formned may, in fact protectan the bacteria.

  Thank God we found staphwash!!9 an antibacterial wash that kills 100% of the bacteria.)
  My daughter is off doctors care cause the infection is GONE!
  and animalwash is helping our cat heal now too!
  http://www.staphwash.com
  this should be in every home if you ask me! Cathy

• Marisa // Apr 15, 2008 at 7:13 am

  My mother passed away on Feb. 25th. from Sepsis, aged 68. From being in perfect health, she had come down with the flu a couple of days before and by third day was rushed to the hospital by ambulance and died in ICU roughly 12 hours later. I had never heard of Sepsis in my life. I am wondering if she caught this at the hopital or could this have developed on its own as a consequence of the flu? Also, Sepsis was not mentioned as a cause of death, therefore not mentioned on the death certificate. Is this because hospitals do no want their records to show too many Sepsis cases?
  Marisa

• Dayle // Apr 15, 2008 at 6:52 pm

  Marisa - -I am so sorry to hear about your mother! Like you, I lost a parent to MRSA. My dad died just about a year ago - -after a bump to his right leg - and eventual infection - - - then a quick trip to the hospital from the assisted living facility. Within 72 hours dad was in ICU - - he lived for 22 more days.
  As I have real A LOT this last year about MRSA - -it is very possible for some people to be exposed to this in a hospital….but it is also very possible to come in contact with it nearly anywhere there are alot of people (you may remember recently a number of stories on the news about schools where students have had MRSA).
  When my dad died I asked why MRSA was not listed as the primary cause of death (kidney failure was primary - MRSA secondary). My college roommate is a doctor - -he says frequently someone dies of something that the MRSA may have caused - - so the MRSA is secondary. I really don’t agree -but……..
  Again, I’m sorry about your mother. All of us who have been effected by MRSA need to continue to educate others!
  Dayle

• mary marshall // Apr 15, 2008 at 9:23 pm

  please keep my husband mike in your prayers. He is scheduled to have a surgery in the morning. I hope and pray that we will not go through what we did last year. Thanks for your support–mary

• Cathy // Apr 16, 2008 at 6:24 am

  My prayers are with you !!!!! Say a prayer to St. Rita!! She’s the patron saint of healing wounds!!!! I know it can’t hurt and it seems to help!! Good Luck and God Bless!! Cathy

• Rob // Apr 18, 2008 at 3:47 am

  I am 26yrs old and went in around mid January 08′ for what I thought was a pimple on my lower back that ended up growing to about the size of a ping-pong ball in about 3 days, and was referred to a specialist who did a biopsy on the area and told me it was “a form of MRSA”. Between Jan. and March I had roughly 4-5 minor procedures to take care of other sores that ended up apearing the same way in the same area. Mid March I underwent a larger surgery (put me to sleep) and the doctor cut out a roundish area the size of a CD on my lower back where the sores had been appearing. He went to the bone and then pulled the skin together tightly leaving a vertical opening. It is now roughly 4 wks since the surgery and around the 2nd week other smaller sores started to appear on the skin around the opeing. I saw the doctor immediately but he didn’t seem worried at all even though they felt the same and although smaller in size they looked the same. he was even telling me that it might be “folliculitis” which occurs from hair groweth. WHAT? The thing that surprises me most is that I don’t think I ever heard him refer to MRSA at all after that initial time, back in January, when he first shared the biopsy results. I was not told what to do to prevent it from spreading on me let alone how to care for it so as not to spread to others. They really treat it like it’s no big deal but then I see on TV and on line where other doctors are saying how serious this is. My doctors do this BIG surgery where the area will be bleeding and draining for 6 wks and I have to constantly change the dressing let alone the fact that I am physically scarred permenantly, and now your trying to tell me that it is an infection caused by HAIR GROWTH? I heard of a similar story like mine and it helped to hear that I am not alone in this. It seems that many major hospitals and doctors are downplaying this virus and not providing patients with proper advice. Everyone has a unique experience here but there are more similarities than we may think. I am a runner and would have to say a rather healthy guy who hasn’t been to a doctor in a very long time so I guess I would be someone who got this from the community somehow and not during a hospital visit. But where does that put me? Should I be worried that my condition is never going to get better and that I have to deal with this the rest of my life, however long that is? I am a born again Christian and I have the assurance of being with my Lord and Saviour when I die but at 26 I want to be thinking about HOW TO LIVE and not WILL I DIE. I guess I just want someone to admit that I have this virus and what I should do to deal with it instead of pretending I don’t have it and just deal with the sores as they appear. It’s very painful, both physically and emotionally.

  God Bless,
  Rob

• Phyllis // May 5, 2008 at 8:48 am

  My Brother in law has C - Diff and is in critical cond., he is swollen all over and looks like he will pop. Has anyone heard of C - Diff making you swell. He has been in the hospital for weeks now and is getting worse.
  Appreciate any help.

• rossie // May 7, 2008 at 9:49 pm

  Ive been bit by a spider 5 yrs ago now living in alaska, ever sence the spider bite i have been getting bumps all over my body the doctors now say its mrsa, every medicine they give doesn’t work I don’t know what to do…

• cathy // May 14, 2008 at 7:18 am

  Today is May 15th ~
  45 days after our experience with this horrible bacteria began; and I’m so happy to say both my daughter and my cat are bacteria free!!!!!! The sore on my daughters arm is completely healed from the inside out thanks to STAPHWASH and the Dept of Agriculture says my cats bacteria was eradicated through the ANIMALWASH process!!!!!! YEAH!!!!!!
  Please if anyone has any questions as to how we got rid of this so FAST see”STAPHWASH.com” they are the makers of the ANIMALWASH also.(made for animals with MRSA) Wonderful product!!!! Can NEVER thank them enough for giving our lives back!!! And saving the lives of my daughter and our cat!!!!! Cathy

• teresa // May 19, 2008 at 4:01 pm

  A friend of mine was diagnosed with sepsis the one in which his blood is infected. The doctors say that he has 78% chance of dying in the next 2 weeks. They believe that the infection is too far gone and they are not treating him with antibiotics. They have basically left him there to die. I just don’t understand how they could have let it go so far and not notice it (he lives in a nursing home) and now that they did notice it they will not treat him! I am so upset and I wish I could be there with him but I cant (he lives in Ohio and I live in Georgia). And his family cant make it there and I just don’t want him to go through this alone. My mom and I have been praying for him and I ask all of you to pray for him. I want him to know that even though we are not there with him we still care for him and we are with him in spirit and that god is and has always been watching over him.

• James Pate // May 19, 2008 at 8:47 pm

  Teresa
  Nursing homes are infested with MRSA and alot of other very bad becteria. They just don’t know what to do…
  We have a product name StaphWash that kills Staph/MRSA on contact. I am trying so hard to get it in nursing homes & day care centers with no luck. WHY??? Because insurance and Medicare will not pay for it. So they just let people suffer & die.
  My prays are with YOU.
  http://WWW.STAPHWASH.COM

• Lynn Frost // May 19, 2008 at 11:55 pm

  Teresa,

  My heart goes out to you and my prayers as well. I know for a fact that God is greater than our circumstances and that He will never leave us or forsake us.

  My Father died of sepsis (I believe it was the c-diff variety) on January 7, 2007. He was two weeks shy of his 89th birthday and had been living in an assisted living home. I believe he might have contacted it in the home because I knew there was something wrong with him right before Christmas. He stopped answering my calls. He said he complained of his body twitching or shaking at times which had never happened to him in the past. He fell in the middle of the night and thankfully the staff at the home checked in on him and called an abulance for him immediately because he was not responsive. At the hospital they check him out thoroughly for several things but not infection. About the fifth dayl he developed a fever and they thought he might have pneumonia. They gave him an antibiotic. From then on he got steadily worse. Like you, I was not able to go see my dad because he was in California and I am in Oregon. It was very difficult for me. It put me in a position to trust God even more.

  After much thought about this over the past year, I have come to the conclusion that the hospital could have acted much sooner than they did and checked for the infection. By the time they realized my dad had sepsis, it was too late and he was too sick for the antibiotics to work.

  I loved my dad dearly and could not believe this could happen so quickly. Previously he had been in the hospital off and on, but he always recuperated very quickly. He was onery and could not wait to leave the hospital. He didn’t like anyone taking care of him; he was very independent!

  Teresa, this I do know about a situation like this one…if you pray, God will answer your prayers exceedingly abundantly beyond all that you ask or pray. In my case, I know my dad who was a Jewish atheist met his Messiah when he went home! I know he will be there to meet me when it is my time to go home.

  I will agree with you in prayer right now Teresa according to Matthew 18 that wherever two or more agree as touching any thing it shall be done for them of their father in Heaven. So we two agree that your friend will not be alone but that God will send laborers to comfort him and protect him and reach out to him. We also agree that he will know that you are with him in spirit through this. We pray for a healing touch upon his body right now Lord that You touch him and cause him to be completely whole. In Jesus name, amen!

• juanita // Jun 6, 2008 at 7:44 pm

  There is currently a Europe-wide push by Intensive Care physicians to get hospitals aware of Sepsis, and how to treat it correctly - I live in the UK, and the Department of Health and National Health Sevice have endorsed it, as the treatment you get in the first 6 hours, if correct, has a major influence on outcome. The movement has a website at
  , which has a lot of useful information,, but relies on local healthcare champions to pressurise hospital managers to implement the care pathways it recommends. Trouble with sepsis, is if you ‘guess’ the pathogen responsible, and you guess wrong, you end up treating the patient with an antibiotic that doesnt attack the main culprit, it just kills off any remaining ‘friendly’ bacteria that are helping fight the main bacteria causing the sepsis - and the patient dies - giving the wrong antibiotic is the actual cause of death for most patients with ’sepsis’! Sad but true, Kenyan doctors (who have poor facilities) know more about Sepsis and successfully treating it than most UK or USA hospitals !

  Copy their website for free, and stick it up in every hospital in your area!

• juanita // Jun 6, 2008 at 7:49 pm

  Teresa, (May 19th posting) - they are pigs for withdrawing treatment - its murder they call ‘futile care’ - its never futile to try to save a life rather than money! I once watched a filthy old tramp, covered n dirt, smelling of his own urine and faeces brought into a Casualty Department, and witnessed a team of 7 people working on him in Intensive Care for 5 hours to save his life. They didnt care who he was, and did this as a testament to who they were - so many elderly people are just told ‘treatment is futile ‘ when a few dollars of the right antibiotics would save their lives - its Ageism - we have it in the NHS in the UK, and its apalling - do hope your friend pulled through -

• Amanda // Jul 8, 2008 at 11:16 pm

  My grandmother went to ER the 24th of June with horrible neck pain. They gave her a pain patch, took some blood samples and sent her home. She didn’t feel comfortable going back to stay by herself so she came to my parents house to stay for a while. On the 28th, we took her back to the ER as she was declining rapidly. Turns out they were practically expecting her as the blood tests they had run showed she had MRSA. They knew and yet did not tell us but rather sent her away to possibly infect my family. The MRSA is now in her blood and they have no hope of any recovery. We don’t know how or where she got this infection; she doesn’t have any wounds or sores. She is now heavily medicated, as if in a coma, to control her pain and we are left basically waiting for her heart to stop. I think this is one of the worst things out there, with cancer or AIDS you can say goodbye and even with a heart attack or stroke you don’t have to watch your loved ones suffer. Please let this end soon.

• cathy // Jul 9, 2008 at 6:58 am

  Amanda, I’m so sorry to hear about your grandma.
  This has to be VERY difficult for you all.
  The doctors need to be taking this alot more seriously than they are!!
  They basically did the same thing to us with my daughter. They -knew that it was MRSA before they tested yet they sent her home with antibiotics and said to put “Tripleantibiotic ointment on it”. Which is the worst thing you can do; as it is the WRONG kind of antibiotics to treat this bacteria. They didn’t even tell us how contagious it was and gave her a note to return to school. (THANK GOODNESS I KEPT HER HOME ANYWAY!!!!)
  I truly believe that if I hadn’t extensively researched MRSA myself and found STAPHWASH to use; that my daughter wouldn’t have an arm today;let alone her life. The doctor office actually called a week later to see if she was going to make her appt. and were VERY SUPRISED when I said” yes “as they expected her to be in the hospital. Why if it is THAT serious hadn’t they called to check on her?!? When I did take her to appt they treated us like LEPERS and wouldn’t let her touch anything or go into the waiting room, but yet hadn’t said a word before about it even being contagious and would’ve sent her to school!!!!When the doctor saw her arm and how much the STAPHWASH had helped heal it ,she was amazed, yet didn’t seem interested in knowing HOW it got better so fast!! What we’d used! I couldn’t believe it!
  We need to somehow band together and make a stand!!! To make the doctors and medical association wake up and start treating this as something serious; because IT IS!!!! People are loosing their limbs and their lives! Who’s with me on this?!!?

• cathy // Jul 9, 2008 at 7:02 am

  Juanita, You mentioned a website for a movement, but I don’t see it in your post. Could you put it up for me? I’d like to join the fight!!!!!

• Lynn // Jul 9, 2008 at 9:15 am

  Cathy,

  You mention the product Staphwash. I tried to find it online with no success. Could you please tell me how to locate some. I would like to keep it on hand in case I ever need it.

  Thanks,

  Lynn

• cathy // Jul 9, 2008 at 10:33 am

  Gladly ~ As it took me hours of searching to find anything that would help. http://www.staphwash.com they also have the staphwash for animals that we used for our cat
  they were very helpful at central usa distrib where we got it. The owner himself called everyday to check on my daughters progress which is more than ANY doctor did the vet was more concerned than the doctor i tell you they dont realize the seriousness

• Michele // Jul 17, 2008 at 6:42 pm

  My grandfather just passed away 7/6/08. He was 84 yrs old. He went in the hospital for pnuemonia (they first told us no it is just bronchitis) and we fought with them because we KNEW it was pnuemonia. I have been his primary live in care givier for 4.5 years and I KNEW they were wrong. They sent him home, 2 days later they called at 1am and said bring him right in he has bacteria in his blood. We did. Then they did another draw and said oops we were wrong there is no infection it must have been a bad draw. They also said oh yea, the radiologist read the scan and he DOES have pnuemonia…HELLO WE TOLD YOU THAT 2 DAYS AGO BUT NO ONE LISTENED. Anyway, they also found a mass the thought was either lung cancer or lymphoma. They discussed with us his options and he opted for a bronchoscopy, which he was told would give them the answers they need. Well, it didn’t so they urged him to have another type of procesure (I forget them name) but this one was a little inscision on his neck. He did it. He was fine. Long LONG sotry short…he contract MRSA sepsis and the hosital NEVER told us. We would have done things a lot differently when his life was ending…A LOT different. I am not saying he would have lived much longer but we would have had more then 5 hours to prepare and be with him. We only found out the cause of death was sepsis from the FUNERAL DIRECTOR (who is a family friend) and then when we finally got his death certificate it said sepsis 3 days pnuemonia 1 month…He was only in the hospital 16 days…how can they say 1 month….
  My family ultimately feels he was written off because of his age. We also feel like they neglected him as far as his care goes but not completely informing him and us what the truth was. We are ALL very well trained when it comes to his health and we KNEW something wasn’t right, esp when it took over 2 hrs when we would ask to speak with a dr…OH and we was NEVER EVER in ICU!!!! Makes me wonder how these drs can live with themselves….

• R G // Jul 22, 2008 at 11:17 am

  Please pray for my mother Dorothy B. She has MRSA sepsis. She picked it up in the hospital through tubing, iv line or catheter. When you go to the hospital tell everyone who touches you to “Please wash your hands or don not touch me” this is how MRSA is spreading. Protect yourself and ask even the doctor to wash first!!!!!!!!!

• Jeanine Thomas // Jul 29, 2008 at 4:47 pm

  All too often this has been allowed to happen (for decades ) and the elderly just slipped away from being infected with hospital-acquired infections. Family members are not even told if it is MRSA, just a staph infection. I know this for a fact because this happened to me, I was never told I had MRSA and after returning to the hospital with an infection from ankle surgery , six days later I became septic and went into septic shock and mulitple organ failure. It was a miracle that I survived and I decided I had to do something about this. So many lives have been lost and so many have suffered - this was all preventable. That is why I fight as hard as I can for change and awareness.
  Jeanine Thomas
  National Spokesperson for MRSA and Founder
  MRSA Survivors Network

• gerrie // Aug 11, 2008 at 3:45 am

  My husband is on dailysis. He was in the hospital with mrsa-ie for 31 days. Now he is being administered gentamcin and daptomycin with his dailysis for the next 6 weeks. Is this c-diff the next problem?

• Mandy Randall // Aug 17, 2008 at 12:44 pm

  To make a long story short,here is the just of it.my daughter was born with liver disease she had a liver transplant at 2yrs old.she was in great health after her surgry.10yrs after her transplant my daughter became very sick,she said my back and neck hurts she was vomiting,fever,this all happend november 2007.anyways she was taken by ambulance to CMH,in Chicago,Ill.Right away the doctors said she was haveing probloms with her liver so the doctors put in a drain in her liver to drain the bile,A simple procedure gone bad.my daughter came back to the icu blown up 3 times her size,she was on a breathing machine,kidnet dialisis,paralized for pain.the doctors said when they took her back she was alot sicker then they thought.a week later and they tell me she has sepsis.a month after that she needed a new liver and kidney she was on yhe transplant list for one day.she was to sick the next day to do any surgry so she was taken off the waiting list.I believe if the doctors never put that drain in she would be alive today,the doctors did not treat her for sepsis right away,this was a 2 month hospital stay,this is just a glimpse into what happend.my daughter died JANUARY,20th 3 days before her 14th birthday.

• cathy // Aug 18, 2008 at 10:47 am

  I am so sad to hear your story! I wish the doctors would realize the seriousness in this bacteria and how much pain it has caused. My dad died Nov 29,2007 of pnemonia but what the death certificate didnt say was that it was brought on by the MRSA.So it is not on the books as a death by MRSA BUT IT VERY MUCH WAS!!!!!!!!! He was sadly infected for five long years before it took him. To see the strongest man I’ve ever known turn so weak and loose the fight was very sickening. They tried every antibiotic known to no avail we finally took him off the intrvenous and called in hospice within days he could no longer tolerate feedings as his lungs were filling yet they say it was pnemonia. WE NEED TO WAKE THIS EDICAL PROFEESSION UP!!! Imagine my horror when they told me mty daughter and her cat both had MRSA! Thank God we were able to treat it in both topically before it got into the bloodstream. I’ll swear by staphwash for this is what killed the dirty rotton bacteria that tried to take my baby too!!! They should be using this stuff in the hospitals and nursing homes but NO so it continues to spread and people continue to die. It’s Very Sad!! Cathy

• lorraine // Sep 10, 2008 at 7:31 am

  my mum died 2 weeks ago today she had emphazema and was ready to come home when she had a sputum test that showed mrsa , so she had it in her lungs they didnt want to tell her that she had it untill we kept asking y she was put on iv antibiotics , then they told her . she was put in a side room on her own and i mean on her own the only time she saw a doctor or nurse was when she had her meds. has anyone tried to sue them and if yes can you let me no how you got on. we are in the processe of doing so , so fingers x

• lorraine // Sep 10, 2008 at 7:33 am

  my mum died 2 weeks ago today she had emphazema and was ready to come home when she had a sputum test that showed mrsa , so she had it in her lungs they didnt want to tell her that she had it untill we kept asking y she was put on iv antibiotics , then they told her . she was put in a side room on her own and i mean on her own the only time she saw a doctor or nurse was when she had her meds. has anyone tried to sue them and if yes can you let me no how you got on. we are in the processe of doing so , so fingers x no doctors or nurses washed there hands either

• Linda // Oct 11, 2008 at 8:26 am

  I have mrsa in my bowels. Ihave not had any surgeries the doctor do not know how I got it. I take doxycyclin 2x aday. I also have had a infection in my kidneys then got yeast infection. Wonder if any body else has had this in the bowels. Thanks Linda

• Diane // Oct 11, 2008 at 11:10 pm

  My Dad passed away Sept 24th from a severe sepsis infection. He started having health problems last July…3 months after myMom passed away. After several weeks in and out of the hospital at that time…he came home and fought with a C-Diff infection on and off for months before it seemed to finally resolve. About three months ago, he began experiencing swelling in his arms and redness which was passed off as dependent edema, even though I was convinced that wasn’t ALL it was. He started twitching alot in his sleep and was having alot of shortness of breath along with UTI’s. He began his trips into the hospital August 13, 08 and was in and out twice…never really seeming to be “better.” Third time he was admitted Sept 13th with much the same symptoms as the 2 other previous times. Was put in ICU for one night and then moved to Progressive Care where he was supposedly “progressing” even though we kept complaining that he seemed the same or seemed to be getting worse. A few days later he ended up back in ICU in respiratory failure, kidney failure, still swollen seeping arms which I believe was untreated cellulitis for months, severe low blood pressure and severe sepsis which would not respond to any antibiotics. Every day there would be new bacterias and yeasts growing in his blood cultures. He suffered multiple organ failure and passed away, I believe, unnecessarily. Plain and simple negligence on doctors and staff’s part to recognize symptoms or to listen to our concerns and complaints. Tomorrow would have been his 89th birthday and I, as many of you, feel the general consensus is..they’re old…so what’s the difference. We are requesting his medical records from both the hospital and the home care agency that followed him, and are seeking the advice of a malpractice attorney. I know nothing will bring my Dad back, but someone needs to start stepping up to the plate and calling these professionals and facilites on the carpet. It’s been said that doctor’s simply bury their mistakes..and I believe it!!

  I wish all of you the best with your loved ones that are blessed enough to still be pressing on and fighting through their illnesses.

• Annette // Oct 12, 2008 at 7:18 am

  Diane-
  I am so sorry to hear about your father.I know exactly what you mean. My family and I went through a similar situation with my father back in 2003 and still till this day, just can’t understand how something like this can happen!! We live in the best country in the world and people are dying from a horrible infection! Best of Luck to you.

• Cinde // Oct 15, 2008 at 11:08 am

  My husband died on Oct. 13 from c. diff sepsis. He acquired c. diff while in a rehabilitiation hospital — recovering from 3 months in a hospital and skilled nursing facility from a form of vasculitis, an autoimmune disease. He was making excellent progress, and had finally come home after 95 days. He was home for 15 hours, at which time I had to have him transported back to the hospital, where he had his colon removed, but he just couldn’t fight anymore and he died from sepsis.

  I knew nothing about c. diff until a few weeks ago. Now I know that 60% of all patients in hospitals and nursing homes will get it. So please, if you’re planning surgery, start taking probiotic supplements to strengthen the good bacteria in your system.

• Diane // Oct 15, 2008 at 8:28 pm

  My sympathies to you, Cinde, in the loss of your husband.

  Truth be told, C-diff does not have to be the epidemic it has become in this country. It spreads so rampantly because health care facilities, nursing homes and the like are not clean. The workers do not take the proper precautions because they feel safe knowing that typically your immune system has to be compromised or you would have had to be on large doses of antibiotics to contract it. The spores can live on clothing, so anything that comes in contact with the bacteria in one person’s environment, can easily be transferred to another’s.

  The entire system makes me sick and in this country we live in, there is absolutely no excuse or explanation why otherwise recovering individuals have to be stricken with these bacterial infections that end up taking their lives.

  If all of us who have been personally affected in some way by these things could somehow get our voice heard, maybe it would make a difference for the future. It’s too late to do anything for some of our loved ones, but one day, we ourselves, may be that one lying vulnerable in a hospital bed in some facility going through the same thing our loved ones have…it has to stop.

  Pure carelessness is what much of it boils down to.

  Again, my sympathies in your loss.

• Dianne // Oct 19, 2008 at 12:41 am

  I know how you all feel and am sorry for your losses it is so hard to know there was something they could have done if only treated correctly from the begining . My sister was 26 and turned 27 Sept 1rst 2006 But had been sick for about 2 weeks prior she went to the ER complaining of high fevers and Boils all over . I dont mean to gross people out but she had lots of puss coming out of the areas. They just gave her antibiotics and sent her home. She ended up back in the ER a few days later same thing but only worse off then before . They did they same thing gave her more antibiotics and sent her home. The 3rd time she went in very bad off they even noted in her records that the patient was very confused and couldnt speak clearly and were going to admitt her only to have a nurse tell her her medicaid didnt cover it so she was sent home. The forth time a few days later she went by ambulance to a different hospital and was admitted into ICU very bad off . Well she never made it out. They said she had Pnemonia very bad and had a long road to recovery but would be fine. Well she was put under and treated intraveniously with one of the medicines they used to treat MRSA but no one made mention of it what so ever . they had given her so many antibiotics by this point nothing would grow in the petry dish to find out what it was. Again in her records it was noted while she was under that more boils were found under her breast. Then one morning after a week and a half her heart just stopped. They couldnt revive her. It was too late but no one addmitted it was MRSA and was not treated correctly and sent home to die because she had medicaid. The medicine they had given her made the bacteria get stronger and was no chance of saving her. We went over and over her medical records from the first time she went to the hospital and it was Obvious a MRSA test should have been done but was not. They just let her die due to their incompitence. A 27 year old women should never have died from pnemonia caused by MRSA . I am not in the medical profession but when I heard all her symptoms and did some research it was very obvious what it was. Her organs upon autopsy were harden also so she had been suffering alot . Her little boy turned 5 yrs old a month after his mom died. She never knew she was not going to be able to leave the hospital so was not able to even say what she wanted for him or last words. It is sad how they let people die from this everyday. If you have Medicaid you are in a even greater risk !

• Dianne // Oct 19, 2008 at 12:49 am

  lorraine….I just saw your post….we took all of ,my sisters hospital records to a lawyer hey wouldnt go up agaist a big hospital …but they were taken to another one until someone finally listened . It was obvious they thought that was what she had was MRSA or near the end they would not have put her on the antibiotics strictly used for MRSA then they just stopped them. but no one ever once said a word . they were sued and my sisters son has money waiting for him when hes older now but I am sure hed much rather his mommy .

• Tish // Dec 4, 2008 at 11:19 am

  My father recently passed away on 10/20/08 from bacterial infections. He had MRSA, C-Diff, VRE, AS WELL a fungi. He was diagnosed with Pancreatic cancer in April 2008, he underwent a successfull whipple and his nodes were clear. His doctor recommened radiation and chemo, so he did those for @ 5 weeks over the summer. He became so immune suppressed from the treatments and malnurished. He checked into the hospital on 9/17/08 for tests to see if an infection was lurking, there was one near his liver and it was drained. He never got better only worse day after day. On one of his many CT scans, fluid was seen in the left lobe of his liver.They let it sit there for 10 days before doing anything with it. After draining it a few days later he ended up with VRE. They took a very immune suppressed, malnourished 70 year old man and put him in unbelieveable danger. We are awaiting his medical records still. The death certificate states Pancreatic cancer after all doctors agreed near his end there was no cancer. The death certificate said nothing about bacterial infections, sepsis, etc…. He beat cancer but no one told us @ sepsis. He died 5 days after his 71st. B’day on 10/20/08
  I am so sick of these doctors, they do not tell you of the dangers of chemo and radiation, how it will immune suppress you and you are at risk for bacterial infections, you know why? They can not be paid for good advice to just stay away from the chemo and radiation, you had a successful surgery and your nodes are clear.
  UNBELIEVEABLE!

• Heather Amato // Dec 24, 2008 at 3:04 pm

  I just found out today that my 85 year old grandmother has been diagnosed with MRSA, so I googled it to find out more information and I came across this website and started reading. I just want to say I am very sorry for all the loved ones lost. And, the information posted is very helpful, I will make sure that we pay close attention to the care received by the hospital and doctors. She didn’t have any prior illness, no surgery or cancer, she ended up in the hospital this time for breathing problems. A month prior she was in the hospital for abdominal pain, they said everything was okay and released her a few days later. She has lost 20 pounds in the last two months lets hope they didn’t miss anything a month ago…because it seems the longer the MRSA is left untreated the harder it is to recover..

• Sandra // Jan 17, 2009 at 4:16 pm

  My husband died of MRSA/Sepsis on February 10, 2006. He had pneumonia and we have no idea where he got mrsa/sepsis from. We were married for 35 years he was my heart and soul and I miss him with every fiber in my being. I just wish I would have known some thing about this infection or how to be aware of it, but I never heard if it till he got it. Maybe someone can do something in order to bring this terrible infection to light and maybe it will save one family the heartache that I am experiencing.

• Dianne (to Sandra) // Jan 17, 2009 at 5:33 pm

  Hi Sandra Im sorry for your Loss. I know what you are going through. I lost my younger sister who was 26 when she was getting ill went to the ER in Raleigh several times each time worse. Even in her Medical records it says the patient is unable to speak clearly and they sent her home with antibiotics ..she had boils with fever and they never even tested her for anything like mrsa .
  She ended up being sent home again the 3rd time she visited the same ER even worse off then ever. Her final visit to the ER was at a different hospital in Raleigh where she was put in ICU,she
  turned 27 while in there . They incubated her after a few days,which means they induced a coma. She never came to again. Her organs shut down as her oxygen level went lower and lower even with oxygen. Essentially she drowned. In the Autopsy reports it states her organs were hardened. She had MRSA they just couldn’t tell due to they gave her antibiotics before testing . Which I was informed by the CDC ( Center of Disease Control) Was the reason they couldn’t tell what was happening to her …they said she had a long way to go but she would be ok. She turned 27 while going through this on Sept. 16th. She Died Sept. 27th 2006 when her heart stopped and could not be revived. They still couldn’t tell us what it was , even though they knew it was something that had been there for quite some time and she had Pneumonia as well which is another symptom of MRSA . She was environments that made her more susceptible too. I want to get the word out to people if you have a sore or a bump that looks like a zit that doesn’t go away but just gets worse especially WITH A FEVER
  Go to the doctor and do NOT let them give you medicine until they test for MRSA ….Hey your paying them right ?? Don’t wait for them because once the more meds they give you with MRSA the STRONGER it becomes and attacks harder. I learned a lot about MRSA you could say, after my little sister died that morning. I felt so guilty for being alive and being older then she lived to be for a long time. I even was mad and appalled that time dared to continue on the calendar as if nothing happened. I have my moments every day where I think of her and my mom , She died July 2008 of a Staph infection in a shunt she had inserted a few years prior for kemo. She had beaten lung cancer but it came back. Although they didn’t think it had to do with her passing. I also believe she gave up after Heather died. Maybe blamed herself in some way.
  Well I have rambled and if youve made it here I’m sure you’ll be glad to know I will wrap it up here.
  Just remember….don’t always depend on doctors to fix u or even treat you correctly. Not with your life…there’s too much at risk.
  My sisters little boy , Michael turned 5 and started kindergarten the following month after his mother passed away from this infection that COULD HAVE BEEN TREATED if NOT for her having MEDICAID I believe to be one issue that led to this Injustice that took my Little Sister’s life.

• Kathy Day // Jan 21, 2009 at 6:00 pm

  My 83 year old father died on Jan 9, 2009. My mother and I held hands as my Dad took his last breath. We had already told him he could go becasue he just had to work too hard to stay. He was all worn out.
  He was admitted to his hospital in late Sept for a minor fracture of his ankle and urinary infection. He rehabilitated there for 12 days and was discharged home. He contracted MRSA pneumonia at that hospital while he rehabilitated.
  He was home for one and a half days and he collapsed with MRSA pneumonia. He never walked again. He endured 20 more days in that same hospital and had heart attack, MRSA bladder infection, hearing loss from Vancomycin, extreme loss of appetite and strength. He weighed about 125lbs when he died in the nursing home a just under 2 weeks ago.
  My father was vulnerable to these infections becasue of his COPD. But, that is no reason for hospitals to NOT use proper precautions, NOT screen patients so infected patients are not put in with noninfected patients, NOT treat these illnesses for the length of time to make people better. There are way too many things that hospitals are NOT doing to prevent these infections.
  I have written a legilative proposal for my home State of Maine. I suggest others do the same until every state in the US has an effective law to help prevent these horrible infections. CDC just isn’t moving fast enough
  I miss my Dad so much……he didn’t deserve to die that way.

• Jackie // Jan 26, 2009 at 4:14 pm

  My granson who lived with me just died DEc22,2009.Seotic shock due to to sepsis.Mrsa
  was also on his report.He had brain surgery
  and came home on Tuesday Dec16.I had him back to Riley ER on Dec20 because his wound looked infected where the stitches was.They sent us back home and gave him antibiotics and sent him home.He was bripought back on Sunday Dec21.Put on Life support and died on Monday afternoon.He was only 12 Yrs old.This was devastating.I had never heard of sepsis before or seotic shock.They had got all his tumor and the surgery went fine.It was the wound infection that killed him.I blame the hospital er for taking this infection lightly and not admitting him to hospital until cultuere got back.

• Jackie // Jan 26, 2009 at 4:23 pm

  WE had good insurance and they still sent him back home.They told us to call the office on Monday to get an appointment on Tuesday for a wound specilist to look at it.They did not do any lab work.Only a culture.Also I told them he had not been eating or drinking hardly anything and they just ignored this.

• Kathy Day RN // Jan 26, 2009 at 5:11 pm

  I am so sorry to hear of your loss of your grandson. It is devastating to family to see such a young person do well with surgery and then become sick and die from infection.
  My father also died from MRSA that he contracted in a hospital. As far as I am concerned, medical advances and technology are moot if the end result is being disabled or dying from MRSA or other hospital acquired infections.
  You need to write all the way up the chain of command at your hospital and demand answers from your hospital. At the same time, you need to call your senators and representatives to see what they are doing about MRSA and other hospital acquired infections. I would also consider getting an attorney to help you.
  Hospitals need to be accountable for these mistakes and for their neglect. If they aren’t these infections will continue to happen at an alarming rate. The doctors attitude is that these things happen and there isn’t much they can do about it. That attitude comes with lack of accountablility. MAKE THEM ACCOUNTABLE! These infections can be avoided with the right infection control measures.
  GET MAD and ACT!! Don’t let hospitals get away with this.

• Jackie(for Kathy) // Jan 27, 2009 at 8:26 am

  I am very sorry to here about your dad.It is devastating to lose someone you are close to
  and even worse when their death could have been prevented.You can tell on the medical report that they are trying to blame my granson for picking at his wound.He was also Bipolar and they brought up his mental condition on the medical report.This happened at Riley Hospital in Indianapolis,Indiana.Shouldn’t they have admitted him at the ER on Saturday .I knew the wound was infected and I’m no nurse or doctor.He even had to go in ER on Saturday in a wheel chair because he was weak,He also went out in wheel chair.Thanks for letting me vent.I lay awake at night reliving this nightmare!

• Jackie(for Kathy) // Jan 27, 2009 at 9:00 am

  When he went to Marion General on Sunday they transferred him back to Riley which is 70 miles away .By the time he got there he was in Acute Respitory Distress .Put on all forms of lifesupport and coded twice.They had incubated him before he left Marion.They said they did this as a precaution.I also noticed at marion (as I look back on it0 that his nails had already started turning blue.He got to marion General Hospital at 4 P.M and they finally got him to Riley at 9 P.M.The weather was so bad that Lifeline was not running.

• Jackie(T0 Mandy) // Jan 27, 2009 at 2:15 pm

  My heart goes out to all of you.Mandy I can say I know how you feel about your daughter.Everything went fine for my Grandson with his brian surgery.When I took him back to ER on Saturday(4 days after his release date,I feel like his infection was taken lightly.On sundayall of his organd were shutting down.By the time he died on Monday afternoon,his heart was gone.I was going to donate his heart but it was not any good,They made no mention of MRSA.They said septic shock.His whole body was full of infection.I sent for a copy of his medical records and on the culture was MRSA.
  Conveniently the culture for Dec20 ,2009 that they tok at ER is yet to be found

• Carol // Feb 15, 2009 at 9:07 pm

  My dad died of MRSA last week. He went in the hospital for open heart surgery to replace a valve. The operation went very well and he recovered nicely. But his prostate became enlarged and he needed prostate surgery. The doctors admitted that he contracted MRSA during the prostate surgery. My dad was 85 and was mentally alert and in relatively good health. It makes me so angry that he survived two major operations yet died of a staph infection. My prayers to all of you.

• mary m // Feb 16, 2009 at 12:11 am

  Carol Im sorry for the loss of your Dad due to the infection. My prayers are with you

• Kathy Day RN // Feb 16, 2009 at 9:07 am

  Carol, I am so sorry about your Dad. MRSA is the plague of our hospitals in this modern time. It is avoidable and unnecessary. I know you are grieving and in pain. And if you are anything like me you are angry and frustrated as well. My 83 year old father died of Hospital Acquired MRSA pneumonia on January 9. His admission to the hospital was a minor fracture of his ankle.
  When you find the strength to move on, contact your state and federal representatives and sentators by mail or phone and demand that something be done about MRSA. There are proposals in the works nationwide and in individual States to prevent MRSA in our hospitals. We always looked at our hospitals and doctors and other healthcare givers as saviors. There are modern medicine and surgical procedures to save lives that never could be saved in past years. But, if we don’t prevent MRSA and other hospital acquired infections. a lot of the modern medicine is moot.
  Please be vocal and let those in power know about your loss and your Dad’s unnecessary suffering and death.
  My thoughts are with you.

• dianne // Feb 16, 2009 at 9:27 am

  I am sorry for your losses …I do understand how it feels my sister was 26 years old and was ill with boils and had to keep going to the ER and they just sent her home everytime with antibiotics. One Note from the hospital was that she was so ill she couldnt speak clearly and yet still sent her home with no thought for a MRSA test. We think she got it from a hospital since she had to go alot for her back and knee problems and she had went alot to the hospital with our mom. She turned 27 in the hospital after a week after going in the ER they now had to addmitt her in the ICU she was so bad. She was given all sorts of medicines and since they had given her so many antibiotics nothing would grow in the petrey dish. But they started giving her the only meds that can fight MRSA …but it was too late by that point. Her heart stopped and her little 4 yr old boy lost his mommy before his 5th birthday. SHE had just turned 27 she was so young and they let her get so ill there was no going back she had Medicaid and I believe this was the reason for her shotty care. Her organs were hardening and her lungs filled with fluid and she pretty much drowned from the Pnemonia caused by MRSA . My mother then died not even 2 years later from a Infection in her shunt they had to put in her chest. Dont wait for doctors to catch things , It is often to late ……

• Carol // Feb 16, 2009 at 1:56 pm

  I was just looking at my dad’s death certificate and it does not mention MRSA anywhere! That makes me really angry. The main cause of death is listed as congestive heart failure and the secondary cause is sepsis. But the sepsis was due to the MRSA! I find this a little misleading on the hospital’s part.

• Mary // Feb 24, 2009 at 5:55 pm

  I am glad to have found this forum. My mom died Jan. 22nd of ‘complications from a lower leg extremity laceration’-that is what it said on the death certificate. My mom really died of a C-diff infection that caused her to go into septic shock. My mother SHOULD NOT have died. She was a healthy 77 year old gentle lady, who NEVER hurt a soul. Her foot was ran over by a car-she had surgery and had to go to a rehab facility afterwards. She started to have diarrhea and to make a very long story short-17 days after her injury she died from septic shock brought on by C-diff. I am an RN and was there for that whole final week and am so shocked at some of the stuff that was missed by the staff-I cannot stand it. You have to be there 24 hours a day I swear and still there are no guarantees that the person will survive.
  Of course I have alot of guilt and remorse that I should have done more.
  My heart goes out to all of you-I share your pain.

• Mavis // Feb 24, 2009 at 6:42 pm

  Jackie….. I wish you could email my daughter. She needs someone to talk to. Megan was her only child. It has been just over a year since Megan died from SEPSIS! It has been devistating to all of us. But Megan’s Mom Mandy
  is getting deeper into depression. Megan was only 13 and loved everyone. She fought two months to live. We all feel that hospital killed Megan.

  Thanks for listening.
  Megan’s Grandma, Mavis

• Jennifer // Feb 25, 2009 at 9:11 am

  I feel your pain, even though my daughter survived MRSA it wasnt because of the proactivity of the Hospital. I took her 4 times to the ER and they said she had the flu, the 4th time I refused to leave. She was admitted and within 24 hours it was determined she was Sepsis and immediatly transferred to Medical City Childrens in Dallas, TX. She spent the next 30 days there with surguries everyday almost to go in and scrape the infection off her bones in 5 different places. Even after release from the hospital it was 6 more weeks of iv antibiotics that I had to administer. Fortunaly she pulled through it. I still have a great resentment to the hospital for not taking action practivily. My grandson delveloped a boil we took him to the ER last night and even though the Medical Community are well aware of the dangers of MRSA they did not do a blood culture, they simply sent us home with antibiotics. Well for a 12 month old child it wont take long to become sepsis if it is in fact resistant which they wont know bc thay didnt do a culture. This would have saved valuable time with my daughter’s mrsa and I cannot beleive hospitals do not automatically do it when they see staph. To me it shows they must want to keep this dirty little secret exactly that a secret.

• Kathy Day RN // Feb 25, 2009 at 9:30 am

  Every patient needs an advocate. As advocates, if you question something and get no response, keep trying. There is a ladder of hierarchy that you climb. If your staff nurse doesn’t answer your concerns, keep going. Never be intimidated by anyone. Your loved one means more than hurt feelings of the staff. You aren’ t being an advocate to win friends or gain status. You are there to help your loved one be safe and to recover.
  While my father was in the nursing home, I asked all the time why he wasn’t eating. No answers. It took weeks to get the doctor to do any diagnostics and by the time he did Dad was dying. His kidneys and liver were failing. He essentially didn’t eat for 2 months, he just drank water and milk. No wonder he was so thin profoundly weak. I kept at them. I didn’t win any friends and the doctor was incredibly defensive. I think I made him think though, even though it didn’t help my Dad. He didn’t like it one bit. The only call I got from him was the call that Dad “had taken a turn for the worse”. It was the night Mum and I sat with him until he took his last breath and left us.
  I got the results of his blood and urine tests when I requested his medical records. That doctor never called me to tell me anything or even express his sympathy. There was absolutely no compassion from him.
  Never give up on your loved ones. Like Mary and me, it may not change the outcome, but we have to try our best for our loved ones.

• cathy conner // Feb 25, 2009 at 9:45 am

  My husband has cancer of the tongue,which has now spread to his glands. Fri morn they will remove half his tongue and do reconstuction with a portion of his forarm they will also remove 10-20 of the glands in his neck. He will have a trache due to the swelling so he can breathe. I’M SCARED TO DEATH!!! Not from the surgery itself, but the fact that he will be in the hospital for 10-14 days!!! How will he keep from getting THIS!!!!!! I already had to yell at one student doctor to put on gloves before he did a small needle biopsy on my husbands neck. They won’t LET ME be around for more than 15 mins every 2 hrs for visiting so how will I keep him safe!??! I’m so terrified! My dad died from MRSA (well that’s not what the death certificate said but that’s HOW the pnemonia finally did.) and my daughter had CA-MRSA on her arm last March and I can’t see that precautions are in place.. Anyone have any suggestions for me on how to protect my husband while in their care??? I don’t want to loose another family member due to this horrid bacteria. I saw what it can do!! Help!!!

• km // Feb 26, 2009 at 2:26 pm

  Hi Cathy…Has your husband had any cultures done yet(testing for MRSA) prior to the surgery?

  I suffered numerous sinus infections and was treated with antibiotics for over a year. I was finally convinced sinus surgery was the only way to go…I had this done on an outpatient basis in Dec 08. I never got any relief, in fact, I got worse…I was told everything I was experiencing(headaches,flu-like symptoms,fever,etc) was “normal”… but I just had this sinking feeling it wasn’t…after numerous office drainings&debrisments, my mom suggested that I ask him to do a culture test-reluctantly he did. One week later, I received a call late in the evening from my doctor…he informed me that I now have MRSA in my sinus cavities-but that I shouldn’t worry. HA! Easy for him to say!!! Anyway, he said 4 out of 10 people are walking around with it and they don’t even know it-I should consider myself lucky, continue taking the antibiotics I’ve been on before and schedule a second surgery w/him!?! I contacted my primary care physician only to be refered back to the doctor that did my surgery (Funny though…my primary doc is the one who sent me to this surgeon, yet now he doesn’t want to be involved!?!)
  On my own, I contacted an infectious disease doctor… I am now on a cocktail of Bactrim, Flagyl, and Bactroban nose ointment for the next 6 weeks. In 3 weeks I go back to see him to have follow up tests, bloodwork,etc done.

  Perhaps you could speak with your husband’s doctor/surgeon and explain your concerns & maybe he’ll place him on an antiobiotic cocktail as a precaution? YOU have to be his advocate now…don’t be afraid to ask!!!:)
  I wish you & your husband the best of luck & will keep you in my prayers….
  God Bless

• simplywm // Mar 1, 2009 at 9:24 pm

  So sad and sorry to hear about MRSA and so many people have to lose their love ones.
  But may I asking you here that.. so far is that any possibility to recover from MRSA?
  , and not to have it again?

  Today is 3.1.09 my husband who had kidney transplant PCKD last 2 years (no doubt that he still has to go to the hospital every month at least) received lap result from culture test that
  he has MRSA, last 2 days after started taken TRIMETHOPRIM-SULFAMETHOXAZOLE 160-800 MG. Nothing seem to be better.
  And he has so much pain( his buttock.)

  Before it happens
  Last Jan-Feb 09 he got the bad cold & sinus /ear infection and that took him all one month to recover from the cold.

  Honestly, we are so scared. Both of us never known about this symptom before.

  Thank you & god bless you!

• taylor // Mar 17, 2009 at 6:09 pm

  my name is taylor i am 11 and i recently had mrsa a couple of weeks ago i was playing with a friend and we pet a stray cat and it bit my leg im very alergis to cats so i went to the hospitail a couple of days after the nurses came in saying i had life threatining mersa on my knee they gave me every thing they could but nothing worked i couldent walk i had to be in a wheel chair it was a mounth i was in the hosptail now and nothing was working it was only a matter of time before they had to rest me :’( then one day my mrsa was just a scar it had held thanks to my wonderful doctors and nurses. thanks to them i can live to this day there is still a scar a huge scar on my knee and i was in the hospitail for a mounth and 15 days but its all over know.

• km // Mar 20, 2009 at 4:32 pm

  Brief update…I am now on home IV antibiotic-Vancomycin 2hours-twice a day…so far, I feel the same. I’m a little holier now though…Yes I am religious but I actually mean full of holes now…I get blood taken from me twice a week by a home care nurse. Word to the wise-if anyone begins home IV- DO NOT let the nurse(s) take blood from your mid-line catheter!! This can easily cause a puncture in the catheter and all kinds of problems happen then! I learned the hard way…just make them take blood from your other hand…it may cause another hole, BUT it’s worth it in the long run!
  Now I’ve been told by a few nurses that I will NEVER get rid up it, it(the MRSA) just goes into like a “remission”. However my infectious disease doc told me I could be cured!?! Who do I believe?!? Any answers &/OR comments would be GREATLY appreciated!!! Thanks and don’t forget to enjoy the GIFT of TODAY!!!

• ym // Apr 15, 2009 at 12:33 pm

  My son got into a terrible accident in 2007 they fixed him up then forgot a gauze inside of him 8 days from the surgery 13 days from the accident the Doctor blamed ICU, ICU blamed the 1st hospital, we found the gauze if we weren’t there with my son he would not be here today within 24 to 36 hours he had full blown MRSA and there were people dying of it in the hospital, no one told us about MRSA , after a couple days they said if the 3 antibiotics don’t work his kidneys and liver will fail. The power of prayers We cannot let his immune system go down or get hurt because its in his bloodstream for the rest of his life. hes partially blind, partially deaf, he cannot taste or smell, sometimes he cannot move, they never fixed his broken neck so its on his spinal cord, he is labeled TBI Traumatic Brain Injury we’re trying to get him in a Neuroskills facility but its hard because he’s on Medicaid. You think you go to the hospital to get well not expecting to come out with a life threatening or very contagious symptom in your blood, and they tell us we can’t do nothing about it, my son was only 19 he struggles every day. Never take for Granted Always Appreciate every minute of every day! We are constantly looking to keep his immune system up and help to get him to a Neuroskills facility, he’s young and he can get better, where we live there’s no facility. We’re looking on how to make the quality of my son’s life better. We would really appreciate any knowledge , comments, and help! Notification of email must say MRSA . Thank-you very much, Mahalo, Love Peace Health & Happiness

• mary m // Apr 15, 2009 at 8:22 pm

  I did not know that mrsa stayed in the bloodstream !? Does that mean a person could get infected at anythime again?

• Rhonda H // Apr 19, 2009 at 11:28 pm

  Up late with nightmares…..again! My mom died Apr.1, 2009 and I can’t get the images out of my head of all that she went through. She was 64 and ultimately died from Sepsis (or VRE). She went in Feb.15th for triple-bypass surgery that went okay, until she started having all the other complications (like everyone in the above comments). She was in a “drug-induced coma” for at least 10 days until finally the drugs weren’t helping her improve. I HATE the doctors, nurses and anyone else that wouldn’t listen to us. We felt like we were “insulting” them by asking questions. Questions that we didnt understand the answers to anyway or maybe didn’t want to hear the answer out of fear.

• Carol // Apr 20, 2009 at 12:47 pm

  My heart goes out to you, Rhonda. My dad died of MRSA on 2/7 of this year.
  Mary, I was told that the MRSA was out of my father’s body but that the damage had already been done. It’s very confusing.

• Saddenned in CA // May 5, 2009 at 1:21 pm

  My grandmother had back surgery in December 2008 and passed away yesterday, May 4, 2009 from sepsis. I am saddened, angry and devastated. She saved her money for her co-payment and couldn’t wait to hopefully be pain free soon an now she is gone. How could this happen?

• rachel // May 13, 2009 at 9:55 am

  My daughter (who I adopted)lived only 1month. Her death certificate says MRSA sepsis. She was released from the NICU in Chicago Illinois with the infection and we were never told nor showed the medical records until today and she passed on 4/10/2009. I do not feel right pressing charges against the hospital but we have five other children who are going through absolute hell. I think i need to continue and press charges to get the hospital to own responsibility and clean the NICU and staff up. Ronald Mcdonald House in St. Louis Mo would receive a majority of any compensation.

• Mary // May 13, 2009 at 10:18 am

  I am so sorry to continue to hear of all these losses. Rachel-my heart goes out to you and your family.

  thinking of everyone

  PS-I had written back in January of my mom’s death-you can see it above-well I am back on here because my father has the same infection right now and is battling for his life. I have had the worst year so far in my life because of these horrid infections…I pray my dad survives this.

• Carol // May 13, 2009 at 10:26 am

  Mary, I am praying for your father. Did he catch this from your mom?

• Carol // May 13, 2009 at 10:33 am

  Kathy Day RN - I have a question. You stated that we should write to hospital. I would love to write a letter to the hospital in which my dad acquired MRSA and died. But to whom should I write? What should I say? I’m not even 100% sure he got MRSA there. How can anyone know where MRSA has been acquired? Thank you.

• Kathy Day RN // May 13, 2009 at 10:56 am

  When I wrote to the hospital that my father died in, I told them exactly the types of things you are saying in these letters. Tell the CEO of the hospital your father died in how your father’s death impacted you and your family. Tell them how it effected his widow’s (if he is survived by a widow) emotional state, expenses etc. Tell them that you know that hospital acquired MRSA infections are preventable and ask them what their MRSA infections control policy is. Ask them anything you can think of and demand answers. Ask how many others have died in that hospital becasue of MRSa infections.
  I am not saying they will answer your questions…them probably won’t. But it is definitely a cathartic thing to express your anger, frustration and sadness to the hospital that is resonsible for your loved one’s death. I wrote twice to the CEO of my fathers hospital.
  To tell you the truth, I don’t think she had any clue about the MRSA problem in her hosptal until I wrote her……and that is pathetic.
  By writing, you may also help others.
  I hope this information helps.

• Carol // May 13, 2009 at 11:21 am

  Thank you so much, Kathy. I will write to the CEO of the hospital. One other question: How can I be sure my dad got MRSA from this hospital? He had been in the hospital for 7 weeks but during this time period he was in two different rehab centers then returned to the hospital with bladder infections. He finally needed prostate surgery in the hospital and the next day he was extremely sick with MRSA.

• Kathy Day RN // May 13, 2009 at 11:32 am

  Without his medical records it would be kind of difficult to determine that he got it in the hospital, but if they didn’t do any MRSA screening, and your father had it (colonized in his nose or other body part) before surgery , the hospital is still responsible for not finding that out before his surgery. He was certainly at high risk for MRSA with his 7 week hospitalization/Long term care stay. So, the hospital should have screened him for MRSA before his prostate surgery. Chances are the surgery caused his MRSA colonization to spread into his body invasively and cause his sepsis.
  Again, I do not have the records on him, but I am pretty sure the hospital is responsible in one way or the other for your Dads MRSa infection.

• Carol // May 13, 2009 at 8:29 pm

  Kathy, thank you for your reply. My dad’s doctor told me that each time he was admitted/re-admitted to the hospital he got a nasal swab and it always came back negative for MRSA. So I am assuming he got it in the hospital. Can nasal swabs be wrong? Could MRSA have been colonized in his prostate and the nasal swab still be negative?

• Kathy Day RN // May 14, 2009 at 7:34 am

  There is always room for error, false negatives and false positives in any culture. But, in any case, your father wasn’t sick from MRSA before his surgery and he had it after, so he contracted it in the hospital. As far as I know, and I am not a doctor, MRSA would not be in his prostate until it had the opportunity to get in there during surgery. The microbe was either on his body and spread inside his body during surgery, or something in the environment…surgical instrument, infected health care worker, or other source in the environment, spread it inside his body during surgery.
  I am curious to know if he had chlorhexidine baths/showers before surgery. It a disinfecting soap, same as Hibiclens or phosohex.
  There are so many things that need to be done to control this epidemic. Some day it will all get pulled together and ALL hospitals in this country will do the same effective things to prevent HA MRSA. My Maine proposal was written using the 2003 SHEA MRSA and VRE guidelines. I believe the country wide MRSA control measures can be found in that set of guidelines.

• Carol // May 14, 2009 at 10:35 am

  Thank you once again, Kathy. Twice during his 7-week stay in the hospital my dad was sent to a nursing home for rehab. The second time the hospital sent him with a Foley bag. I’m thinking that he could have gotten MRSA at the second nursing home via the Foley. But when he went back to the hospital his nasal swab was negative. It’s all so confusing.

• Carol // May 14, 2009 at 10:36 am

  Kathy, I don’t think he got any showers before his two surgeries at the hospital. Would that be in his medical records?

• Kathy Day RN // May 14, 2009 at 10:43 am

  Yes, the showers or baths with chlorhexidine should be in the medical record.
  You mentioned he had urinary tract infections while being treated. What was the bacteria in his urine. Was it MRSA? My father had MRSA in his urine. The foley cath could very well have introduced MRSA into his bladder. From there, who knows where it could go. Seems if he had it in his bladder, they would not have thought he was a good candidate for surgery, too risky for post operative surgical site infections.
  As I said, I am not a doctor, and I do not have his medical records, but I am pretty sure your Dad contracted MRSA in his hospital…one way or the other. Just outright ask them where he caught it and what you suspect. It would be interesting to see what their response is.
  My father’s hospital never denied that he caught it right in their facility…that was one good thing about them…that little bit of honesty.

• Carol // May 14, 2009 at 12:04 pm

  Kathy, I do not think my dad got these showers before his two surgeries. Would this be in his medical records? The original bladder infection he got was sudomonis (sp?), not MRSA. If my dad got the MRSA through his Foley in the second rehab, would the hospital/surgeon be able to tell that it was colonized in his prostate before they operated on him? His nasal swab at the hospital came back negative, but I’ve been told they are not 100% reliable.

• Kathy Day RN // May 14, 2009 at 1:02 pm

  Unless the urine culture showed MRSA, or there were other cultures done, such as sputum or blood cultures, there is no way to know if there was MRSA inside your father prior to surgery. IF he had a urinary tract infection, it was probably just in his bladder although UTIs can travel up into the kidneys. It is unlikely your father was “colonized” in his prostate before surgery.
  If the nasal culture was negative, it does not mean he was negative on other parts of his body, such as the groin, rectum, armpits or other body parts. If he had any open sores he could have had MRSA in those. He could have been colonized in or on other parts of his body and no culture was done. Screening cultures will just tell you that there is MRSA in the nose and some doctors will do decolonization before any surgery. Not all surgeons will do that though.
  The chlorhexidine baths would have helped clear MRSA from his skin if it was there. Remember, nasal cultures are generally for screening purposes but other body parts can be cultured too if indicated.
  If you want to write to your hospital, ask them all of the questions you have asked me. Don’t be gentle, …if you have suspicions about things, they are the things to ask about it. Without a medical record, it is impossible for me to answer all of these questions accurately.
  Your father had several risk factors for MRSA infection. He was a long term care patient, he had a foley catheter with resulting infection, he was transferred back and forth to different facilities, he was elderly, and he was on a number of antibiotics………all of these things made him vulnerable to MRSA infection. I assume there may have been other risk factors.
  From what you have told me, I am still pretty sure your father contracted his MRSA in the hospital.

• Carol // May 14, 2009 at 2:17 pm

  You have been a great help to me, Kathy. From what you have said, I am assuming there was no way to screen for MRSA in my dad’s prostate before surgery. He was told that he had an enlarged prostate (common after the heart surgery he had in December). The enlarged prostate was giving him the bladder infections and causing him to need a Foley.

• Karen // May 22, 2009 at 6:02 pm

  My heart goes out to all of you, or for anyone that has went through this. I wrote my first comment back in March of 2008 after losing my Father to infections. It has made losing him even harder knowing that it was all because of neglect. One of the best things that I did was to contact my local Department of Health and had them look into my Father’s case, and to no surprise the Hospital was cited for 9 violations in his care. that we are aware of. I hope that this would maybe in some small way help another family from going through this. It has been alittle over a year since my Dads passing and the hurt and pain and anger is still there as if it was yesterday. May God Bless all of you and help you find some peace in all of this and the courage to live through it.

• Dori // May 24, 2009 at 9:15 pm

  I lost my 2 year old January 21, 2009 to sepsis. He was born with several heart defects and no spleen. He never tested positive for bacteria. But he did have c-diff in december. Were guessing that was the whole cause.

• Rhonda H // May 24, 2009 at 9:47 pm

  Dori: Oh my goodness! I’m so sorry to hear about your loss. I have no idea how you must feel. I’ve only come to realize what it truly means to lose someone close to you…someone you love. And still, could not imagine the sadness in your heart for the loss of a child. May God wrap his loving arms around you and comfort you in this time of great sorrow. And I will continue to pray for a cure or change to be made to rid our hospitals of this problem (MRSA).

• Carol // May 25, 2009 at 8:40 am

  Karen and Dori, my heart goes out to both of you. C-diff is really becoming a problem. Here in NYC, everyone made a big deal about the swine flu, but no one seems to care about all the people who die from MRSA and C-diff in hospitals and rehab centers.

• Kathy Day RN // May 25, 2009 at 8:59 am

  It is so frustrating and enraging to think that we are here writing about our losses becasue of preventable infections. If CDC did their jobs, on both the Federal and State levels we would not be forces to air our problems about lax and ineffective hospital infection control in every State in the union.
  Hospital infections are the scourge of modern US hospitals. We hear about medical miracles every day. We know how medical science has progressed, and yet our hospitals are handing out deadly and unnecessary infections to vulnerable patients. To top it all off, we sign “informed” consent when we enter the hospitals that essentially exempts them from liablity.
  I think we all need to start adding our own conditions to those “informed” consents. We could add something such as “I hold this hospital responsible for any infections I catch while I am a patient here”. Add it in your own handwriting when you sign the forms.
  Also, all of us need to go into hospitals armed with our own disinfecting wipes and alcohol hand gel.
  These things can help, but they are not the solution to this problem. The solution is, first of all that hospitals admit and recognize that there is a problem and how huge the scope of the problem is.
  Then they need to start using programs that have been effective in Northern Europe, parts of Australia, the VA hospitals. They HAVE to start using Active Detection and Isolation to PREVENT these infections rather than reacting to them.
  Please, all of you, contact your local, state and federal legislators and tell them your stories and demand that something be done NOW.

• Carol // May 25, 2009 at 10:27 am

  Kathy, unfortunately, since most of the people who die of MRSA and other infections are those at risk, such as the elderly and cancer patients, hospitals use that as an excuse. Well, you know, your father was 85, I was told, and he had a bad heart, so he was not able to fight the MRSA. But he shouldn’t have gotten it in the first place! MRSA was not even listed as one of his 4 causes of death. I called his cardiologist to find out why and he said that if my dad didn’t have a bad heart, he would have survived the MRSA. How could he know that? Until middle-aged, relatively healthy people begin to die of MRSA, then maybe something will be done. I hate to say that and I certainly don’t want anyone else to die of MRSA, but it seems as if most of the people who die from it now are “negligible” in the eyes of the hospitals.

• Kathy Day RN // May 25, 2009 at 10:44 am

  My father was 83 and he had a heart attack because of the MRSA. He had the infection first and the stress of it on his body caused the heart attack. He had never had a heart attack before the infection and he had never been hospitalized specifically for his lung problems either.
  Hospital acquired MRSA kills and infects young people too. Fortunately they have more strenght to fight it off so deaths are not as common as with older people. But, many young people have been disabled by the infections.
  Peoples’ vulnerablility is no excuse for hospitals to continue to allow this scourge. We can’t ever lay the responsibility of these infections on the patients. It is the responsibility of hospitals to prevent infections, not cause them.

• Kathy Day RN // May 25, 2009 at 11:36 am

  I might clarify that if a patient is admitted with an existing infection, it is certainly not the hospital’s fault, unless they caught it there on a previous visit.
  Their responsibility is then to isolate that patient with an existing infection from other patients so the others don’t contract it. It is way too often that does not occur.

• Dianne // May 25, 2009 at 12:48 pm

  Hi Kathy Day RN I READ YOUR POST AND AM SORRY TO HEAR ABOUT YOUR FATHER HAVING PROBLEMS WITH MRSA…..
  MY SISTER WAS 26 WHEN SHE STATED GOING TO THE ER FEELING ILL AND FEVERS BOILS THE WORKS …SENT HER HOME WITH ANTIBIOTICS……
  SHE DIED IN THE HOSPITAL A MONTH NOT EVEN A MONTH LATER WHEN THEY FINALLY ADDMITTED HER IN TO ICU ….SHE WAS PUT IN A COMA SINCE SHE WAS SO BAD….SHE TURNED 27 WHILE UNDER AND NEVER WOKE UP ….HER HEART JUST STOPPED ….THEY DIDNT CATCH IT IN TIME AND JUST SENT HER HOME TIME AFTER TIME UNTIL IT WAS TO LATE …..SO UNFORTUNATTLY MRSA CAN EFFECT YOUNG PEOPLE TOO.

• Carol // May 25, 2009 at 5:15 pm

  My condolences to Kathy and Dianne who lost loved ones to MRSA. If a patient is admitted to the hospital and his nasal swab tests negative for MRSA, does that mean that MRSA is not colonized anywhere else in his body? I have a gut feeling that my dad got MRSA in the rehab center through his Foley, got a bladder infection, was sent back to the hospital and was told he needed prostate surgery. I’m wondering if the colonized MRSA, possibly in his prostate, was spread throughout his body during the operation and if there was anything the hospital could have done to prevent this.

• Lisa // Jun 12, 2009 at 9:30 pm

  My mom fell and broke her right hip on November 20, 2008. She had a partial hip replacement. She spent nearly two weeks in rehab. She was released to come home on Friday December 5, 2008. We had to call the 911 on Sunday December 7. She was holding her head, moaning that she had the worst headache of her life. The ER did a test for UTI, an x-ray, shot her high full of morphine and sent her home. We could barely get her into the house. She collapsed nearly to her knees. We grabbed her a chair, call 911 again. They said if she was released from the ER there was no sense taking her right back. They carried her to bed. The next day she was confused, in extreme pain. We tried to help her to the bathroom. She collapsed again to her knees. She had no strength to hold onto her walker. Again we called 911. They admitted her. On the eve of Tuesday December 9, she moaned and panted all night. She complained of extreme pain in her right side. She said she had to go to the bathroom but there was nothing. On Wednesday December 10, they did several more tests included a pelvic scan. That afternoon the doctors told us they had to do surgery to clear out an infection above her hip. They said she was very sick and might not make it thru surgery. She did and was in the ICU on a ventilator December 11. No one said the word sepsis to us. On December 12, she was taken off the ventilator. It wasn’t long after that until her bp dropped. She went into caridac arrest. Her DC listed Obstructive shock as #1 cause of death. Also listed, renal failure,myocardial infarction, acidosis, and on down the line septic shock. My questions continue to haunt me. Did she get this sepsis before her first release from the hospital? Was it growing after her hip surgery? did she get it in the ER that Sunday Dec. 7 visit? Wasn’t that what killed her and should have been listed as THE cause? What happened? What could we have done? could they have done? How did this happen?

• Carol // Jun 12, 2009 at 9:47 pm

  Lisa, my condolences on your mom’s passing. My dad died of MRSA this past February after surgery and it wasn’t even listed on his death certificate. Sepsis was listed as the fifth and last cause of death. This bothered me, too. I called his doctor to ask about it and he said that if my dad didn’t have a bad heart, he would have recovered from the MRSA. I don’t think that’s necessarily true. The doctor assured me they weren’t trying to cover up anything because the MRSA was in my dad’s medical records. I still think it’s strange.

• Diane // Jun 13, 2009 at 12:33 am

  I wrote sometime back on this blog about the loss of my father to MRSA/Sepsis/C-diff infection. The only bottom line to all of this is there is absolutely no accountability in these facilities, be they hospitals, rehabs, nursing homes, etc. They do not have proper disinfection regimens in place, and if they are supposed to, noone follows the guidelines. It has become one of the worst ‘jokes’ in this country in recent years. Our loved ones contract these horrendous bacterias in their weakened conditions and that’s how they pass off their deaths. I am still angry over my whole situation and it has taken an emotional and physical toll on me. I have tried various avenues of pursuit, but they all come up dead-end streets because, unfortunately it seems these filthy facilities have more rights than the defenseless patients. They have the right to have you basically sign your life away (quite literally) before treatment. I believe we need to have the right to hold them accountable, in writing, for any diseases contracted while in their care, not directly related to our original illness. I can promise you not a one of them would sign such an agreement. Shame on the leadership in all areas of government that are aware of the untimely, unnecessary deaths in this nation’s health care facilities, and fail to step up to the plate and hold them responsible!

  My condolences to all who have lost loved ones on this board.

  Diane

• Kathy Day RN // Jun 13, 2009 at 9:07 am

  Just one more note along this line. My mother recently had surgery. When we were in the prep area they gave us a form to fill out that asked for 3 things that could make our visit/exerience there better. One of the things I listed was Infection Control because my mother was a recent widow/husband died of hospital acquired MRSA.
  I noticed that the 3 things Mum’s roommate had listed to improve her visit (ie, pain control, etc) were written on an erasable board above her bed.
  Absolutely NONE of my mothers 3 requests were written on her erasable board, not even that she was hard of hearing, which was one of the 3 things we listed. I viewed this omission as a punishment for actually asking to have GOOD INFECTION CONTROL.

  This is how sensitive and GUILTY they are about what they do or more likely what they fail to do.

• Lisa // Jun 13, 2009 at 10:26 am

  Carol,
  I find it strange and very disturbing. I have to make a correction to my other statement. My moms death certificate listed probable pulmonary obstruction as cause of death. It was her death summary that was sent to the coroner and signed by the ER doctor that listed several other causes with septic shock being far down the line. To me, my mom is dead because she contracted an infection that set off a horrific string of events. It is a horrible haunting thing to see a loved one die. I just feel like this could have been prevented. She did so well in her rehab. She mastered every occupational task they threw at her. She worked her butt off to come home. She made it only to end up back and dead a week later.

• Kathy Day RN // Jun 13, 2009 at 12:16 pm

  The infection and sepsis set off a series of events in your Mom. I am about positive. MRSA set off a bunch of horrible things in my father too, and he had done the same thing…rehabbed, gone home with the help of a walker, and then collapsed with the infection.
  Within one day he had a coronary, his blood pressure bottomed out, and numerous other catastrophic medical events took place. He did survive those things, only to suffer and lose weight for about 3 months until he died. MRSA set it all off. It wasn’t a preexisting condition that killed him, it was MRSA.
  He was vulnerable to MRSA because of pre existing problems, but that does NOT GIVE HOSPITALS THE RIGHT TO DISH OUT THESE INFECTIONS.
  They are arrogant and confident when they lie about the actual cause of death and sometimes even that they contracted it in the hospital, because at this point nobody holds them accountable.
  If it is the last thing I do, I will make hospitals in Maine at least accountable. Too many have been carted off to morgues for too many years because of inadequate infection control and failure to identify infections. Nobody should tolerate this. Report them to your State CDC, the JCAHO, health departments, State and Federal Hospital associations, State and local Medical associations. It is just not acceptable and more and more people are becoming aware.

• Carol // Jun 13, 2009 at 12:28 pm

  My dad started off in the hospital and then went back and forth to rehab and the hospital. He died in the hospital of MRSA. One of the most frustrating things is that I have no way of knowing if he acquired the MRSA in the hospital or in rehab.

• Owen Rice // Jun 15, 2009 at 8:38 am

  I recently lost my father to MRSA. He was carted back and forth to the Akron City Hospital.Largest Hospital In Akron.He developed Breathing difficulty from the MRSA and was taken to the 2nd floor of the intensive care unit.Apon his arrival to this unit he was in stable condition but almost over night he ended up on a ventillator and was kept sedated for about 3 weeks. The doctor’s kept insisting that he was dying from a leaky mitral heart valve to justify his admission to this wing of the hospital.Never once did they ever mention that he in truth was suffering fromMRSA even though a warning was posted before entering he room. Any Dr. or nurse who entered the room had to gown up ,wear a mask,rubber gloves. this also included cleaning personnel. He was refuse life saving blood platelets by one of the top doctors there his answer was that the hospital needed them for more deserving patients such as a young accident victim.Finally I had him moved a few blocks down the road to another hospital where again no mention of MRSA.But the same routine Masks,gloves,gowns again.He did get Doctors who specialize in infectious diseases but his condition worsened.He gained 70 lbs mostly due to infections with out eating or drinking anything.Finally The MRSA won ,he appeared to have a stroke his kidneys failed his ventilator was shut down an oxygen mask was placed over his trakia opening ,he died about an hour later.Cause of death multiple organ failure.No mention of the cause of death MRSA.To this day no hospital apology for killing him with unclean hygene practices.Just another cover up

• Carol // Jun 15, 2009 at 10:42 am

  Owen, my condolences to you. I did not receive an apology from the hospital where my dad died, either. And MRSA was not listed on his death certificate. I guess all of us are experiencing very similar things.

• Carol // Jun 15, 2009 at 10:43 am

  Owen, how old was your dad?

• owen // Jun 16, 2009 at 5:31 am

  Dad was 91.He was in very good health until he contracted the MRSA disease and had a Very good mind. Also, I feel that the hospitals that suppress information that that the patient has this disease run the risk of spreading it more as visitors with out knowledge of it or with knowledge of it may take it home with them and keep infecting the general public. Maybe that is their plan, more business for the hospital.

• Carol // Jun 16, 2009 at 11:17 am

  Owen, my dad was 85 when he died of MRSA. I honestly believe that more is not being done about this infection because the people most vulnerable to it (the elderly) are the ones who are dying. You wouldn’t believe how many people (even my friends!) who have told me, “Well, no one can live forever. At least he lived to be 85.” Yes, that’s true; but no one should die, no matter what the age, from an infection inflicted by a hospital or rehab.

• Kathy Day RN // Jun 16, 2009 at 11:44 am

  Carol,
  My sentiments exactly. Our elderly population is of great value to their families, their communities and society in general. Many work hard and succeed in staying well for many more decades than they did just 20 years ago. So, there is absolutely NO EXCUSE for hospitals to continue allowing preventable infections a place to breed and then kill our beloved elderly patients, my own father included.
  On June 24 in Washington DC, Congresswoman Spears of California will introduce a bill that mandates Universal MRSA screening in the entire country. I will be there to help introduce that bill.
  It’s a sad day when legislation is needed to get our hospitals to clean up their acts and keep all patients ,including our elderly, safe from deadly infections.

• Nancy // Jun 16, 2009 at 12:07 pm

  for those battling C-Dif I can highly recommend Florastor (it is Saccharomyces boulardii — a probiotic) My husband was in and out of the hospital with C-Dif until I gave him this and he hasn’t had it since and has taken antibiotics since without a problem. It is a yest, so if you are taking antifungals it will kill it. Better then to use Culturelle (lactobacillus GG.) These are also good for Chrons. Read their web sites.

• Carol // Jun 16, 2009 at 1:13 pm

  Kathy, you said it much better than I did. My own dad, though 85, led a very active life. He so wanted to continue living, even with his heart condition. And for the hospital to tell me that the MRSA killed him because of his bad heart was a slap in the face to me. It was as if they wanted to be let off the hook. Thank you for telling us about Congresswoman Spears and thank you for representing all of us there. I cannot get to California, unfortunately. Is there anything the rest of us can do to help her?

• Kathy Day RN // Jun 16, 2009 at 2:05 pm

  I’m sorry I spelled Congresswoman Speier’s name wrong.
  This bill introduction is being held in DC if anybody can get there.
  She asked for friends and relatives to call their State Reps and Senators to support Rep Speier’s bill or to consider cosponsoring it in the house.
  There is a similar bill in the Senate sponsored by Wexler and Durbin, and it is important to support that as well.
  You can contact Rep Speiers office through the switchboad at at the Capitol in DC.
  If sombody can find a parent of a child who has been gravely effected by MRSA, the office of the Rep would like to speak with them as well. This is very important to all of us, our families and our safety if we become patients in the future. And all of us here do this work in loving memory of our lost loved ones because of a preventable infection.

• ym // Jun 17, 2009 at 12:49 am

  Dear Kathy Day RN,
  How do I get in contact with Rep. Speiers, or Wexler & Durbin. Do you know their phone # or email address.
  I’m not very smart with the computer, I didn’t know you have to respond here, I responded from the email and I never got a response back. I wrote on April 15, about my son, they did surgery reconstructing his face then forgetting a gauze inside of him either 8 days from the surgery or 13 days from his car accident, he got MRSA with 24 to 36 hours, his face & head just swelled then they told me if he doesn’t respond he has just 10 days before his liver, kidneys and internal organs would shut down from the antibiotics. They said don’t let him get sick or hurt, its colonized in his blood stream, if his immune system goes down it can come back to the weakened area. We have ongoing medical, my son has TBI Traumatic Brain Injury its hard because doctors tell us they don’t take medicaid, medicare, or new patient, everytime the doctor is leaving I worry will we be able to find a new one. Iwas told to go to an attorney by a judge, then a doctor told me to see a malpractice attorney, we’ve seen 2 they both said its to costly to prove the gauze caused the MRSA because he had so many injuries buth they both agree it was negligent of them leaving it inside him, they said it would be to costly to prove, we have till July to find an attorney and a doctor to say his damage is from the MRSA., they know he got it in the hospital. He has constant headache, vertigo, tinnitus, left partially deaf, left partially blind, no smell, no taste, never fixed his broken neck because of MRSA and tracheotomy so 7th cervical on spinal cord sometimes wake up cannot move, tingling & numbness,constant pain neck & shoulder, amnesia, loses time during the day or night. He’s just 21 I know he can get better, the accident happened 2 years ago. There are no Neuro Skills facility here in Hawaii. We get a common cold he get really sick. The bones stopped coming out but glass still comes out.
  Any help, suggestion, information would be greatly appreciated. This will be ongoing for the rest of his life. He struggles and gets frustrated. I asked if MRSA eats you up on the outside, what happens when its on the inside and its your face and brain?
  Emails or Phone# I can contact, we really appreciate all the sharing helping one another to learn and cope. Take care always, love peace health & happiness Yvonne M

• Kathy Day RN // Jun 17, 2009 at 5:02 am

  I don’t know where to begin Yvonne. I am so sorry to hear about your son. What a tragic horrible story.
  Hawaii is number one in the US for hospital acquired MRSA. This was exposed in an APIC study in 2007. Maine is number 4. Neither of us gain any comfort from those facts, but it just goes to show you where your own state stands.
  If you were here closer to DC, I know that Congresswoman Speier would want you to come to this bill introduction. Your son’s experience is typical of many. Victims lose their health, their independence, their futures, their income, and many times their lives. All of this happens because of a preventable infection.
  I am astounded that you cannot get a lawyer to take your son’s case. He will have disability and medcial problems all of his life. He will have special medical needs. He is a young man and facing this daunting future.
  If I were you, I would contact all of my State representives and Senators and tell them my story. I would not give up on litigation. Keep calling lawyers and find one that will take you sons case on a contingency. Even if they cannot prove the sponge caused the MRSA, the fact that they left a sponge in his surgical wound is negligence.
  Rep Jackie Speier’s number is 202-225-3531 Senator Durbin’s number is 202) 224-2152.
  Your Hawaii Senators are
  Akaka, Daniel K. - (D - HI) Class I
  141 HART SENATE OFFICE BUILDING WASHINGTON DC 20510
  (202) 224-6361
  Web Form: akaka.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Contact.Home

  Inouye, Daniel K. - (D - HI) Class III
  722 HART SENATE OFFICE BUILDING WASHINGTON DC 20510
  (202) 224-3934
  Web Form: inouye.senate.gov/abtform.html
  Represenative Ambercrombie
  (202) 225-2726
  Representative HIrono
  (202)225-4906
  I hope all of this helps. You have a multitude of problems and you son faces a difficult future. Some of these people ought to be able to help you. Be sure to tell them all that you support the legislation regarding MRSA to make our hospitals safe.

• ym // Jun 17, 2009 at 11:47 am

  Dear Kathy Day RN,

  Thank-you very much for the information, I’ll call rep.Speirs &Senator Durbin and Hawaii rep. Take care and have a wonderful day. You are helping so many of us that are in the dark not knowing what’s MRSA and what damage it does and what we can do to prevent it. Until it becomes a part of your loved ones you may hear it but it doesn’t sink in. This is real this is life, and its hard on the family and work your life is never the same everything revolves around doctors, appointments. Never take for granted always appreciate you never know when your life can change
  Thank-you very much the information is valuable. Everyone support this bill people were dyng in the hospital from a simple scratch!!!
  my phone#(808)329-9119day or (808)315-8043eve.
  Take care always, have a wonderful day, love peace health & happiness

  sincerely Yvonne

• SHAREN // Jun 18, 2009 at 8:28 am

  RECENTLY FOUND OUT MY MOTHER IN LAW WHO HAD BEEN LIVING WITH US FOR 3 MONTHS IS COLONIZED WITH MRSA. WAS TOLD TO ENTER HER HOSP. ROOM WITH MASKS, GLOVES AND GOWN. NUMEROUS HOSPITAL PEOPLES CAME IN WITHOUT ANYTHING, MAKING HER FEEL THAT WE WERE TREATING HER LIKE A LEPER. MOVED HER INTO REHAB AND WERE TOLDJ IT WAS NOT CONTAGIOUS.SHE HAD THIS PREVIOUS TO BEING ADMITTED TO THIS HOSPITAL BUT WE WERE TOLD IT WAS NO LONGER CONTAGIOUS, SO WE THOUGHT IT WAS OK FOR HER TO MOVE IN WITH US. CALLED SEVERAL DRS. GOT DIFFERENTJ OPINIONS FROM OH ITS NOTHING TO BE VERY CAREFUL! I LIVE IN NORTH WESTERN PART OF N.J. CAN YOU RECOMMEND A DR.?I FEEL THAT MY FAMILY NEEDS TO BE CHECKED FOR THIS AND MOST DRS. THAT I HAVE SPOKEN TO TELL ME ITS NOT NECESSARY. I DID BUY A BOOK ENTITLED “MRSA SECRETS” WRITTEN BY A MICROBIOLOGIST AND FOUND IT VERY GOOD. PLEASE LET ME KNOW JWHERE I CAN TURN TO GET CORRECT INFO ON PROTECTING MY FAMILY AND FINDING OUT WHAT WE SHOULD JDO TO BE TESTED AND POSSIBLY TREATED. I KNOW THAT IF WE START OFF AND WIND UP WITH THE WRONG TREATMENT IT COULD MAKE IT THAT MUCH MORE DIFFICULT TO TREAT.

• Roberta // Jun 18, 2009 at 10:12 pm

  This is all so scary. I sit here in tears after reading through the two years of stories. My sister is across the street in bed, as she has been for weeks. She had surgery in April for infected bartholomew glands. An issue she has dealt with all her adult life. This time though she didn’t get better, and when she went back to the dr he put her on the antibiotics and said come back in a week. The next week he informed her she had MRSA. The antibiotics changed. After the 10 days of that the infection show no signs of clearing. So yesterday he went in to clean out the infections. She is so miserable. She can’t eat, she can’t drink. Says everything taste like pond water. For the last week she has been forcing herself to get the fluids in. Tonight she said, I’m done, I’m not going to torture myself anymore. No food no liquids. I sat beside her bed for a few moments, but had to leave. She looks so defeated, so tired and worn out.

  I am so afraid of what lies ahead. But I pray this is the dark before the dawn and tomorrow she will start to feel better.

• Dianne TO Roberto // Jun 18, 2009 at 10:48 pm

  Roberta Why is it your sisters doctor does not have her in the ICU ?? She needs to be on IV ANTIBIOTICS THAT FIGHT IT and IV for fluids so she will not get dehydrated …..that is a big danger for her as well right now !
  Please push the doctors dont take no for an answer ask why they are not using a more aggressive treatment while she continues to be attacked by this deadly infection. If they continue with things that wont work then it will get stronger and it will be to late at that point. Dont lose your sister as I did to MRSA !!!

• Kathy Day RN // Jun 20, 2009 at 3:03 pm

  This is my first day online for several days. My husband and I are now Camped outside DC. We will help introduce the federal MRSA bill with Rep Speier on Wed.
  Roberta, please fight MRSA with and for your sister. She needs to see and Infectious Disease doctor or insist on a telephone referral or consult for her. Her doctors are messing up badly and your sister is slipping away. PLEASE help her.
  Sharon. It is indeed possible you and others who lived with your mother in law were exposed to MRSA. My entire family was exposed too. It doesn’t necessarily mean you will become sick from it. YOu need to stay aware of the fact that you were exposed and other family members were as well. If any of you show signs of infection be sure to alert your doctor to the exposure. Also, if any of your family are admitted to a hospital for anything request a MRSA screening test. Most likely, nobody will do one automatically, but if you request it they will. This will protect a patient if they are having a procedure done that may lead to infection, and also if you have a positive culture, you will be separated from others who do not have MRsa.
  Many of us live with MRSA in our noses, and on our skin every day, but if you are healthy and have a good immune sytem it can remain harmless. I know how scary it all is. I went through the same thing when my father was diagnosed. I had to educate myself about MRSA and I am a nurse!
  I will be thinking of every one of you when I go to the Capitol on Wednesday. I have come to DC because this is important to me and to everyone who has had MRSA of who has lost someone to MRSA. We will fight this thing and with the help of legislation we may win!

• Roberta // Jun 20, 2009 at 5:00 pm

  Thank you Denise and Kathy! She has an appt with infectous disease dr. on the 24th. She did go the ER yesterday.. They gave her a few more prescriptions and sent her home. She was over here today for a little while. Just layed on the couch. We kept trying to give her things. I bought Gatorade and pour it over crushed ice. She tried it.. got a sip or two down and then said I can’t! She is constantly spitting up siliva. Her husband was back over looking for more crushed ice. He says she has a yeast infection in her mouth and below.

  I guess not all hospitals and doctors are so uneducated. My brother up in Boston broke his femur and was in spaulding rehab for about a month. He said everytime you come or go (back to hospital) they test you with a nasal swab and they test your butt. I think if my sister was up in Boston she would get much better care.

  Thanks Kathy and good luck in DC.

• CarolMc // Jun 22, 2009 at 11:21 am

  Good Luck in Washington DC Kathy!!!!

• ym // Jun 22, 2009 at 12:34 pm

  Kathy Day RN.

  Thank-you very much from all of us, being our voice let them hear you, all our pain & suffering for the ones that have passed on and the ones living and with MRSA . Let them hear how the trust & respect we put in the doctors & hospital that are trying to save us then we get something from just plain laziness, sloppiness, or carelessness I don’t know just negligent and then they tell they can’t do anything about it we just have to live with it.

  The frustration, hurt, anger to watch your loved ones suffer because they gave something in their blood for the rest of their lives, that gives them just 10 days.

  They’ve got to hear our voices thru you and everyone with you or there will be many more like my son that a gauze was forgotten inside him (he was just 19 thank God he was healthy at that time) or like your father!

  They’ve got to realize 10 days is all you’ve got its not like cancer or diabetes, if the antibiotics don’t work, the antibiotics is the one that will shut down your kidneys and liver etc! Today we go to the doctor all the time he can’t get hurt or sick it can come back where his immune system is weak.

  I’ve called our state senators & our legislators to support Rep Speirs & Senator Durbins Clean Hospital bill.

  Keep our medical cost down keep us healthy, let all our voices be heard thru you. Thank-you, take care always love peace health & happiness

  Yvonne

• CarolMc // Jun 22, 2009 at 2:39 pm

  I encourage everyone to go to Kathy’s website and take a look at the smiling face of her Father, my father-in-law, John McCleary.

  This is why she fights.

  Trust me when I say, she will be VERY articulate and I wish I could be present to see her in action with Capitol Hill. Everyone that has lost or suffered in anyway from MRSA WILL BE HEARD thru Kathy!

  Hoping to see her on CSPAN 2!!

• cathy conner // Jun 22, 2009 at 3:51 pm

  Lost my Dad too! Sure Miss Him! Good Luck in D.C.

• Roberta // Jun 22, 2009 at 10:01 pm

  My sister SAID she was feeling better today. But then said I’ve stopped taking ALL MY MEDICATION. I said I thought that was dangerous. and she said I DON”T CARE.. Luckily she goes to her DR tomorrow and the infectous Disease DR on WED. Maybe they can talk some sense into her!

• Roberta // Jun 26, 2009 at 10:09 pm

  I have good news. My sister went to the Infectious Disease Dr.. He told her she was free of MRSA. Her infection had cleared up. In the last four weeks she has lost 19 lbs. He told her it was OK not to take any more meds. For Now! He also diagnosed her with Sjogren’s syndrome, which is the cause of her gland issues. She is still very weak, but we are so greatful that she will recover.

  This has been a real eye opener for everyone in my family and we take what we’ve learned here forward. We now KNOW that MRSA is everywhere and will keep viligent when dealing with medical issues.

  I will continue to follow this forum and hope to hear good news from Kathy! Thanks for you encouragement and enlightenment!

• dianne // Jun 26, 2009 at 10:39 pm

  Hi Roberta , I m glad to hear your sister is pulling through …I lost my sister right after she turned 27 yrs old from MRSA . I do not know if it is a good idea for them to say for her not to finish the medicine “for now” If it is still there hiding somewhere then stopping them could cause it to get stronger and not respond next time to medicine. I would just be weary of not finishing all of the meds. Good luck to you and your Familily !!! Dianne

• Marie // Jun 30, 2009 at 11:50 am

  I developed mrsa after lapband surgery and almost died

• Kathy Day RN // Jun 30, 2009 at 12:20 pm

  My husband and I returned home to Maine on Sunday. We spent a week camping 20 miles outside of Washington DC.
  On June 24, I helped Congresswoman Jackie Speier introduce HR 3937, a bill for the prevention of MRSA. I had 3 minutes to tell about my father and his horrible experience with deadly hospital acquired MRSA pneumonia. I hope that I made it clear to all those listening that MRSA is very serious and in most cases preventable.
  Active Detection and Isolation works. Screening, Isolating or cohorting and contact precautions can stop most MRSA from spreading in hospitals, but now they only take these steps AFTER there is a problem. This means they collect data about people who have suffered or died from these infections and then they may start some screening, and/or using precautions. This is not acceptable. The numbers are in. 19,000 people are dying every year from MRSA and that estimate is likely much lower than the reality.
  HR 2937 if passed will help all of the States to avoid the same struggle I have been fighting in Maine. There will be a Federal law that mandates that all hospitals will screen and use the necessary precautions to stop MRSA infections in our hospitals.
  Please contact your Senators and Representatives and ask them to cosponsor and support this bill. It is important to all of us and all of them as well. This bill and the resulting mandate will make all of our hospitals safer.

• Carol // Jun 30, 2009 at 3:07 pm

  Kathy, thank you for all you have done.

• Marie // Jul 1, 2009 at 3:29 pm

  Thank you for all the information. I never realized MRSA was so prevalant.
  Thank you, Kathy

• Rachel // Jul 1, 2009 at 6:44 pm

  Kathy, Thank you for being a voice for all whom have suffered from this serious but preventable disease. People need to remember this is not a hereditary disease it is an acquired disease. Anything that is acquired is optional and does not have to happen. My poor baby would be alive and well without this acquired infection. I am fighting with a lawyer to make Norwegian Hospital in Chicago Illinois to be held accountable and offer an explanation to my other five children as to why their sister is dead due to their negligence. Lets all hope for the best. This site has truly helped me understand more and be able to cope with all the hard things that I need to deal with now. Thank You all so much from my whole family. God Bless

• ann // Jul 1, 2009 at 8:30 pm

  This is hell. My mother is 88. She broke her hip 3 months ago and contacted MRSA in the operating room at. She has been on Vancomyacyn and now her stomach is hurting. The doctors are full of crap. They are very careful what they say to me and email to me. He said maybe she didn’t bathe well the day of her operation and she wasn’t on antibiotics as they like to do to people before surgery or maybe the operating room. I don’t trust them. They are afraid. Now her stomach is hurting and her ESR is way up to show inflammation. They say maybe it’s just her stomach thats inflammed. They operate again tomorrow to see just what damage is being done. Bastards.

• mary // Jul 1, 2009 at 9:01 pm

  Ann please get your mother checked for c-diff. This can be dangerous too!

• Kathy Day RN // Jul 1, 2009 at 9:02 pm

  Blaming the patient is another tactic that infecion control people, surgeons and hosital administrators use. They will blame anybody or anything except themselves! This is why we MUST begin to make them accountable for these infections through new laws!
  Your mother may have had mrsa colonization before her surgery, but if they did not do a preoperative screening, it is their fault. If they had found this colonization, they could have docolonized her skin and nose or other areas of her body that were colonized, and they could have used appropriate preoperative antibiotics in order to avoid infection in her surgical site. I can’t explain her stomach pain unless her infection has spread from her hip into her abdomen. I guess the answer to that will come with this next surgery.
  Don’t allow these doctors to snow you. If they did not take the appropriate precautions, it certainly is not your poor mother’s fault, it is their fault. It is also the fault of the hospital for having an inadequate infection control policy that includes screening of high risk patients. Your mother’s age and her hip replacement both made her high risk.
  Stay on top of this and don’t let them snow you. THEY are responsible and you need to hold them accountable.

• Diane // Jul 1, 2009 at 10:21 pm

  Ann,

  If your Mom is on Vancomycin, orally, then they are treating her for yet another infection…C-diff. I’m only guessing it’s ‘by mouth’ since you said it is making her stomach hurt. Oral administration of Vancomycin is only used for treatment of C-diff because it cannot be absorbed into the bloodstream and will remain in the intestinal tract to treat the infection there. If it is being given intravenously, then it must be treating another type of infection.

  Make sure you know and understand all the details of exactly what she has and what they are doing for her. And, above all, make sure THEY understand.

  Again, I watched it with my own father and wish I would have had the ‘education’ about all these things before his experience. You live and learn, and unfortunately in many of our experiences on this blog…we have lost alot in that process.

  My best to you and your mother. You are her advocate. Don’t let anyone deter you from the truth.

• Carol // Jul 2, 2009 at 9:44 am

  Kathy, I was told the same thing about colonization with my dad. The hospital now says that even though his nasal swabs always came back negative for MRSA, he may have had it colonized in his prostate from the Foley he wore when he was in rehab. What should the hospital have done to check for colonization besides a nasal swab?

• Kathy Day RN // Jul 2, 2009 at 10:07 am

  MRSA screening is done usually of the nose, any broken skin or open wounds,and any foreign bodies, ie, catheters, trach tubes, Naso gastric tubes, feeding tubes, etc. Certain lifestyles may make it necessary to test different areas of the body. MRSA may be harbored inside the body as well and without fluids from inside it is impossible to culture.
  Urine, sputum, blood, cerbrospinal fluids, and any other body fluids can be cultured for MRSA, but that is not generally routine for screening purposes. It is generally done after clinical findings (signs and symptoms) indicate there may be an infection.
  Active Screening is not a 100 percent accurate process, but it will help determine, upon admission and routinely after admission, many patients who are colonized and without symptoms, and many patients who are actually infected with MRSA. Screening is the starting point of prevention.
  Hospitals fight this because it allows them to remain unaccountable for infections, they can keep secret the number of infections that occur in their facilities. It allows them to room infected patients with uninfected patients. It allows them to stay in denial of a huge deadly problem within hospital walls.
  Although Screening is not going to detect 100% of MRSA colonizations or infection, it will detect a huge number of them, and force hospitals to keep those patients isolated and on contact precautions. This in turn will decrease the number of new infections and hospital acquired infections that we are now seeing.
  Carol, as far as your Dad is concerned, it seems that they should have at least done a urine and urethral culture ( since he had a urinary catheter) to see if he had MRSA in his urine or around his catheter. That may have been done. MRSA can be introduced to the body by contaminated hands, instruments and environment during surgery and/or during routine care……..but hospitals will not tell you that. They would rather lead you to believe that your loved one is responsible for their own infection.

• Carol // Jul 2, 2009 at 10:37 am

  Thank you so much, Kathy. Some of this is over my head as I have no medical background, so thank you again for being patient with my questions. I was only told of my dad’s nasal swab screening for MRSA. Do you think it’s a good idea to call or write to the hospital and ask if he had a urine/urethral MRSA screening? This may have told them that the MRSA was colonized in his prostate and they would have postponed the prostate surgery. Or it would have told them that he had no MRSA colonization and that means he caught it during his prostate surgery in the hospital. Either way, it doesn’t look good for the hospital, does it?

• Kathy Day RN // Jul 2, 2009 at 12:00 pm

  I think it would be reasonable to assume that a urine test would have been done prior to surgery, since he was having prostate surgery. If there was bacteria, then a culture should have been done as well and that would show MRSA. Screening for infections before surgery is important. For as long as I have been a nurse…and that is a very long time….blood work and urine tests have been done routinely pre surgery. They used to do routine chest xrays and EKGs too. Not so much anymore unless indicated for some reason. As far as the urethral screening culture, I doubt that they would have done that as a matter of routine even though it should be done , a culture of the entry site of any foreign body such as a catheter or other tubes. It certainly wouldn’t hurt to ask about it. Why not. Let them explain to you why your father got infected. God knows, you need and deserve answers, just like all of us do!

• Carol // Jul 2, 2009 at 12:06 pm

  Thanks, Kathy. Actually, now I remember that a couple of days before my dad’s prostate surgery, a urine culture showed a bacterial infection called sudomonis (I’m spelling it phonetically; I’m not sure how it is really spelled). They cancelled the surgery but didn’t treat the sudomonis because they said they didn’t want my dad to become immune to the antibiotics because they will be giving him antibiotics during the prostate surgery. So I’m assuming his urine did NOT show MRSA. I guess that means there was no colonization in the prostate, or is that a wrong conclusion? I don’t know if a urethral screening was done.

• Kathy Day RN // Jul 2, 2009 at 12:30 pm

  Let’s just put it this way. Your fathers infection was either introduced to his prosate by his urinary catheter or during surgery. Since he had no MRSA in his urine preoperatively, it was likely introduced because of the surgery. Trying to prove that is another thing. It isn’t an exact science for sure.
  Just keep asking them questions. They know you suspect poor technique and/or contamination. You deserve answers.

• Carol // Jul 2, 2009 at 12:38 pm

  Kathy, if there was no MRSA found in his urine sample, does that mean the Foley site was free of it also?

• Carol // Jul 2, 2009 at 7:52 pm

  Why am I having trouble finding statistics for NY state on MRSA? Are MRSA stats available state-by-state somewhere and even by hospital within each state?

• ym Yvonne // Jul 3, 2009 at 12:20 pm

  Dear Rachel,
  I am so sorry to read about your baby! My son contracted MRSA in the hospital also, they forgot a gauze inside of him and we’re still going back and forth to the Dr.s. I asked if MRSA eats you up on the outside what happens when its in your face and brains. My son has traumatic brain injury. We’ve been advised to get an attorney also, but we haven’t been able to find one the 2 that we talked to both said yes its negligent but its to costly to go after, see if you can find someone else statue of limitatation is 7/13/09. Nobody wants to touch malpractice, we can’t do anything. We have to make sure my son never gets sick or hurt. Yesterday we saw the neuropsycologist on the 8 we see the surgeon, on the 13th we see the neurologist, this is ongoing every month. The worry everyday is unbelieveable, the mental stress and the physical stress. We go to the hospital to get well with all our trust in them only to live with something life threatening for the rest of our lives. Wish you and your family the best, goodluck with your attorney, they need to be held accountable, they don’t know how it tears a family apart. They have to be more sanitized & careful.
  Take care always, love peace health & happiness Ym Yvonne

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