Despite changes in the medical field towards the reduction of infections, the rate of antibiotic resistant infections is on the rise. This paper will look at a couple of different resistant bacteria as well as a new treatment that looks to be hopeful.

To understand the concept of antibiotic resistance, one must first understand how a certain bacteria would be able to fight off an antibiotic. When a person takes an antibiotic the drug kills the weaker or defenseless bacteria, leaving behind the stronger bacteria that are able to resist the the drugs used to kill them normally. These remaining bacteria then begin to multiply a millionfold a day. Antibiotics themselves do not cause the resistance but help to create an ideal situation for it to occur. A patient can develop a drug-resistant infection by either contracting the resistant bacteria from another person to begin with or by having it emerge during antibiotic therapy.

A more in depth description of how resistance occurs is as follows. The resistance results from gene action. Bacteria acquire genes containing resistance in any of three ways. In spontaneous DNA mutation, the bacterial DNA may mutate spontaneously. In a form of microbial sex, or transformation, one bacterium may take up the DNA from another bacterium. The most frightening method is resistance acquired from a a small circle od DNA called a plasmid. The plasmid can go from one type of bacterium to another. Therefore a single plasmid can provide many different resistance's. (3)

First there is MARS, Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, which is the second greatest bacteria isolate in hospitals.(2) MRSA is not particularly dangerous

unless it reaches a high colonization ratio. If a high colonization is reached MRSA more often than not causes death eventually.

MRSA is a result of certain bacteria mutating or changing their genetic make up so that they can not be killed by Methicillin, or nay relative of that drug. MRSA has a great ability to develop resistance's against many drugs. For example, penicillin's, tetracyclines, aminoglucosides and glycopeptides to name a few. If a bacteria mutates in such a way that it will no longer be able to be killed by a drug class it is said to be resistant. Despite that fact that there are currently over 160 antibiotics on the market(2), it will not take long for a bacteria to be totally resistant to all the drugs that target it. Thus the patient who is infected with the bacteria will ultimately succumb to the infection resulting in death.

MRSA is especially important in health care settings in that it can be passed form one patient to another with very little effort. The number one proven way to restrict the transmission of MRSA is through diligent handwashing. The handwashing must start with the primary caregivers as well as housekeepers, maintenance personal or anyone that could have contact with the patient or the patients belongings. Patients can carry MRSA in many locations. For example, some patients are completely asymptomatic but can be highly colonized in the nose, pharynx, rectum, wounds or chronic skin lesions. These people are unaware that they are MRSA positive and there for so are the medical personal that are taking care of them. Staff members may be carriers as well ant transmit MRSA to

patients by hand contact, either direct or indirect. Those with a more severe underlying disease or those with and increased number of operations are more susceptible to contract MRSA from a carrier.

Once MRSA has been established in a hospital, it may be very difficult to eradicate. For that reason there is wide spread belief that patients with MRSA shou