What kind of infections does VRE cause?
Complications of VRE
- Bacteremia (bacterial infection that has spread to the bloodstream)
- Urinary tract infection.
- Endocarditis (infection of a heart valve)
- Meningitis.
- Wound infection.
- Pneumonia.
- Intra-abdominal infections (such as peritonitis)
- Pelvic infections.
What is Enterococcus faecium infection?
Enterococcus faecalis and E. faecium cause a variety of infections, including endocarditis, urinary tract infections, prostatitis, intra-abdominal infection, cellulitis, and wound infection as well as concurrent bacteremia. Enterococci are part of the normal intestinal flora.
How do you get VRE infection?
How is VRE spread? VRE is usually spread by direct contact with hands, environmental surfaces or medical equipment that has been contaminated by the feces of an infected person.
How do you get Enterococcus faecium?
E. faecalis infections spread from person to person through poor hygiene. Because these bacteria are found in feces, people can transmit the infection if they don’t wash their hands after using the bathroom. The bacteria can get into food or onto surfaces such as doorknobs, telephones, and computer keyboards.
Is Enterococcus faecium harmful or helpful?
faecium may be pathogenic and harmful to humans, and can cause bacteraemia, endocarditis, urinary tract and other infections. Moreover, anti-microbial resistance (AMR) to many commonly used antibiotics has been reported, and E. faecium is the leading cause of multi-drug resistant enterococcal infections in humans.
How is Enterococcus faecium treated?
Linezolid, an oxazolidinone antibiotic, is available orally and intravenously and is used to treat infections caused by E faecium and E faecalis strains, including VRE.
Is VRE like MRSA?
MRSA can be spread by touching articles that have been contaminated by the skin of an infected or colonized person, such as towels, sheets, and wound dressings; VRE can be transmitted by touching articles soiled by an infected person’s feces.
Is VRE life threatening?
VRE infections typically affect people who are already sick and in the hospital. These infections can be hard to treat because doctors have fewer options that are effective against the resistant bacteria. Some VRE infections may be life-threatening.
Can VRE be cured?
VRE infections can be cured in most patients, and the outcome is often more dependent on the underlying disease than on the infecting organism. The duration of treatment depends on the site of infection. For example, heart-valve infections may require six weeks of antibiotic therapy.
What is VRE in urine?
Antibiotic resistance occurs when the germs no longer respond to the antibiotics designed to kill them. If these germs develop resistance to vancomycin, an antibiotic that is used to treat some drug-resistant infections, they become vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE).
What is the MIC of VRE faecium?
E. faecium is the most frequently isolated species of VRE in hospitals and typically produces high vancomycin (>128 µg/ml) and teicoplanin (≥16 µg/ml) minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs). These isolates typically contain van A genes.
Is the hospital’s VRE infection rate based solely on isolated patients?
VRE colony counts are similar in the stool of colonized or infected patients. If a hospital VRE rate is based solely on VRE isolated from clinical cultures (infected patients), the facility may be adequately reporting its infection rate, but may be underestimating the true burden (and therefore potential transmissibility) of VRE in the facility.
Can you get sick from VRE and not get sick?
A person might be colonized for a long time before getting sick or might never get sick. VRE can cause infections of the urinary tract, the bloodstream, wounds associated with catheters or surgical procedures, or other body sites. Symptoms will depend on the site of infection, but include fever and pain at the site.
How is VRE diagnosed and treated?
How are VRE diagnosed? If VRE infection is suspected, a sample can be taken from the infection site (e.g., wound, blood, or urine) and sent to the laboratory for testing. If enterococci bacteria are isolated, more laboratory tests are needed to determine which antibiotics will be effective for treating them.