title: Prevalence of Staphylococcus aureus from nares and hands on health care professionals in a Portuguese Hospital.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  The main goal was to estimate the prevalence of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus on hands and in nose of health care professionals.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Detection of Staph. aureus on hands or in the nose of 169 individuals was performed. Nasal and hand carriage was found in 39·6 and in 8·9% respectively. About 17·2% of the individuals were carriers of methicillin-resistant Staph. aureus (MRSA) in the nose and 4·7% on hands. The majority of nasal MRSA were resistant to β-lactams, erythromycin and ciprofloxacin. All nasal MRSA were SCCmec type IV and Panton-Valentine leukocidin (PVL) negative. One MRSA isolated from hand was SCCmec type V. About 75·6% of MRSA isolates presented the same or closely related restriction patterns. Sixty per cent of Staph. aureus from hands and from noses from the same individual were the same strain.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  MRSA nasal carriage was high considering healthy health care professionals but in accordance with high level of MRSA infection in Portugal. Isolates recovered in this study seemed to be different from major clones previously isolated in other Portuguese hospitals.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These findings may have implications on the knowledge of healthy health care workers as vehicles of MRSA infections among the community. Presence of several virulence factors may contribute to increased pathogenesis in case of infection.
authors.affiliation: Escola Superior de Biotecnologia, CBQF - Centro de Biotecnologia e Química Fina - Laboratório Associado, Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Porto, Portugal.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Castro
authors.affiliation: Escola Superior de Biotecnologia, CBQF - Centro de Biotecnologia e Química Fina - Laboratório Associado, Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Porto, Portugal.
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Komora
authors.affiliation: Escola Superior de Biotecnologia, CBQF - Centro de Biotecnologia e Química Fina - Laboratório Associado, Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Porto, Portugal.
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Ferreira
authors.affiliation: Clinical Pathology Unit, Gaia Hospital Centre - Oporto University, Vila Nova de Gaia, Portugal.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Lira
authors.affiliation: Infectious Diseases Unit, Gaia Hospital Centre - Oporto University, Vila Nova de Gaia, Portugal.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Mota
authors.affiliation: Escola Superior de Biotecnologia, CBQF - Centro de Biotecnologia e Química Fina - Laboratório Associado, Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Porto, Portugal.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Silva
authors.affiliation: Escola Superior de Biotecnologia, CBQF - Centro de Biotecnologia e Química Fina - Laboratório Associado, Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Porto, Portugal.
authors.forename: P
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6296-5137
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Teixeira
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006225:Hand / Q000382:microbiology*; D006282:Health Personnel / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006761:Hospitals; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D016106:Methicillin Resistance; D009666:Nose / Q000382:microbiology*; D011174:Portugal / Q000453:epidemiology; D015995:Prevalence; D013203:Staphylococcal Infections / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000382:microbiology*; D013211:Staphylococcus aureus / Q000145:classification / Q000187:drug effects / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D037521:Virulence Factors / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D055815:Young Adult
chemical_list: D037521:Virulence Factors
keywords: antimicrobial resistance; enterotoxin genes; hand carriage; health care professionals; methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus; nasal carriage; pulsed-field gel electrophoresis