title: Transmissibility of livestock-associated methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (ST398) in Dutch hospitals.
abstract: We quantified nosocomial transmission rates of sequence type (ST) 398 methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) (an emerging livestock-associated MRSA clone) and non-ST398 MRSA isolates in patients hospitalized without infection control measures in 51 Dutch hospitals. Identification of 174 index patients initiated 139 post-exposure screenings of 9925 persons. There were 65 genotype-confirmed secondary cases (three and 62 for ST398 and non-ST398 MRSA, respectively), yielding a relative transmission risk for ST398 MRSA of 0.28 (95% CI 0.09-0.90), which was not sensitive to adjustment for duration of hospitalization at time of detection. Nosocomial transmission of ST398 MRSA is 72% less likely than that of non-ST398 MRSA strains.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Microbiology, University Medical Centre Utrecht, The Netherlands. M.W.M.Wassenberg@umcutrecht.nl
authors.forename: M W M
authors.initials: MW
authors.lastname: Wassenberg
authors.forename: M C J
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Bootsma
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Troelstra
authors.forename: J A J W
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Kluytmans
authors.forename: M J M
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Bonten
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D015373:Bacterial Typing Techniques; D003428:Cross Infection / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000382:microbiology / Q000635:transmission*; D005838:Genotype; D006761:Hospitals; D006801:Humans; D058751:Livestock / Q000382:microbiology*; D055624:Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D017720:Molecular Epidemiology; D058889:Molecular Typing; D009426:Netherlands / Q000453:epidemiology; D013203:Staphylococcal Infections / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000382:microbiology / Q000635:transmission* / Q000662:veterinary*