Question

Jamie’s is a 48 year old black woman who comes into the emergency department complaining of painful swelling, drainage, and redness over the past 5 days in the left hand. She spends a lot of time outdoors

working in her garden and said she had a shuu. nasty" mosquito bite on the top of that the swelling started. After 3 days of increas ing and redness, she went to her doctor and received an oral antibiotic and was told it was probably a mild infection from the insect bite. Now, she presents because her hand is increasingly painful, tight, and the drainage has worsened. She noticed that she had a fever this morning of 102.9°F. Laboratory test re- sults today show a WBC count of 18,500. After intra- venous antibiotic treatment and hospitalization, the wound culture is found to be positive for methicillin- resistant S. aureus (MRSA). From your reading and expe ore ed swell. rience regarding infectious processes, answer the following questions: 1. Outline the process that is most likely occurring in Jamie's body. 2. What is the probable source of this infection? 3. What would you expect for local and systemic clinical manifestations? 4. What diagnostic tests were used or could be used? How could you differentiate between viral or bac- terial pathogens? 5. What additional treatment measures would you anticipate? How is MRSA treated differently than nonresistant pathogens? 6. What would be the potential complications? Log on to the Internet. Search for a relevant journal article or Web site that details MRSA and confirm your predictions.

Answer 1

The process that is likely occurring in Jamie’s body Is the immune response to the infection. As soon as any foreign substance attack on our body, our body in response shows the inflammation, redness and pain to the particular area.

Methicillin – Resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is a bacterium that causes infections in different parts of the body.

The symptoms of MRSA depend on where you are infected. It causes mild infections on the skin, like sores or boils.

MRSA infections are common among people who have weak immune systems and are in hospitals