The rate of healthy people carrying MRSA in the nose

Abstract

Methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) for a long time has been a big problem in hospital acquired infection and is named as hospital- associated methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus [1]. Gradually it has also become a serious threat to public health worldwide [2] as community acquired MRSA (CA-MRSA). CA-MRSA prevalence varied significantly in recent years [3], therefore knowledge of a local epidemiology of CA-MRSA is required to establish effective strategies in prevention and treatment, including the rational use of antibiotics. So far, there has not been any study of investigating MRSA carriage in healthy people or CA-MRSA that was conducted in Vietnam. In this study, the percentage of healthy people carrying MRSA in the nose was investigated. From this percentage, the threat of MRSA’s transmission in community can be estimated. A conventional culture method of detecting MRSA including isolation, gram-stain, catalase test, coagulase test, and antibiotic disk diffusion test, recommended by the National Committee for Clinical Laboratory Standards of America was used in this study. In the result obtained, 8 samples of MRSA strain were identified in 180 samples which were collected from nose of healthy International University students to give a prevalence of about 4.44% by using conventional method. Compare to other studies in the World, this rate is not high.