MRSA Treatment: Understanding Antibiotics & Options

Medical professionals treat MRSA or methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus with the antibiotic vancomycin. Vancomycin treatment nearly always succeeds; however, in rare cases, MRSA can resist its effects. Doctors sometimes successfully treat MRSA infected boils by draining the infection without using intravenous antibiotics.

History

• Doctors treated staph with penicllin prior to 1960.

  Doctors successfully treated staph infections with penicillin in the 1940s. However, in 1961, British research scientists named this infection, methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), because the antibiotic, methicillin, no longer killed the bacteria.

Significance

• Penicillin antibiotics cannot cure MRSA.

  MRSA shows resistance to methicillin, as well as to beta-lactam antibiotics. Examples of beta-lactam antibiotics include amoxicillin, oxacillin, methicillin and others.

Types

• MRSA patients receive vancomycin intravenously.

  Intravenous vancomycin remains effective for treating most severe cases of MRSA requiring a potent antibiotic. The first case of vancomycin-resistant MRSA emerged in 2002.

Expert Insight

• Doctors culture samples and test for resistance.

  The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) advises clinicians to use
  trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole and doxycycline for MRSA if situations in community settings warrant them. However, for patients with severe symptoms, such as sepsis-syndrome, medical professionals should aggressively employ intravenous vancomycin.

Prevention/Solution

• Doctors use aseptic techniques to prevent infection.

  Patients with infected wounds should keep the area clean and dry. Doctors should wear gloves, a mask and gown when caring for wounds.