Gastrointestinal bug C. difficile on the rise

[xchrom]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/03/24/MN4R1NPENT.DTL&tsp=1

Public health experts have been saying for years that doctors need to scale back on antibiotic use to avoid producing hardier, drug-resistant strains of disease-causing bacteria.

But there's another reason for taking care when prescribing the drugs: Some antibiotics can wipe out almost all of the bacteria in patients' guts, leaving them vulnerable to another nasty infection that's spreading through hospitals and other medical centers all over the country.

Clostridium difficile is a common and ruthless bacterium that causes gastrointestinal distress, from diarrhea in the mildest of cases to painful and potentially deadly colon infections in the worst. There were 336,000 cases diagnosed in 2009, more than double the 139,000 cases reported in 2000, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Nearly every Bay Area hospital has experienced an outbreak of C. difficile, and the bug is widespread in nursing homes because the elderly and those with weak immune systems are especially vulnerable.


Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/03/23/BA4R1NPENT.DTL#ixzz1q2YeOloJ

[MADem]

1. What an aptly named bug! nt

[COLGATE4]

2. C. Diff. (as the medical people call it)

is a really nasty bug. If you have an impaired immune system it will generally raise all kinds of hell with you, and you're in more or less a permanent state of dysentery. It's a bitch to treat, too and requires a long course of really high-powered antibiotics. If it keeps mutating and becomes more treatment resistant a lot of people are in for a world of hurt.