The NCAA notified athletic departments across the nation last week to be on the lookout for a drug-resistant bacterium that has afflicted and even hospitalized some athletes.
The NCAA warning came after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a report detailing how and why college and high school athletes in four states acquired the bacterial skin infection.
Because of the warning, UNM trainers and sports medicine officials said they are stepping up efforts to prevent the drug-resistant strain of staph infection from establishing itself in their facilities.
"The thing we have to be concerned about is open wounds and skin-to-skin contact," said Dave Binder, head trainer for the UNM Athletics department.
The bacterium, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, can enter the body through a skin wound or directly into the bloodstream via an injection and if misdiagnosed or untreated, can become a life-threatening infection. The pathogen, also known as MRSA, is difficult to treat because it is resistant to popular antibiotics such as penicillin and methicillin.
The CDC report points out several clusters of the infection present during the last three years in high school and college sports teams in Indiana, Pennsylvania, Colorado and in Los Angeles County. Members of a Colorado fencing club were diagnosed with the infection in February 2003 and CDC officials predict it was spread by a shared piece of equipment. Seven members of a football team in Pennsylvania were hospitalized after acquiring the infection in 2000.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
Binder said UNM has not had any reported cases of MRSA, but trainers and sports medicine staff are taking every precaution to sterilize equipment and dress athletes' wounds as soon as possible.
The CDC report states that MRSA is often acquired in hospitals or other health care facilities, but the bacterium is emerging as a cause of skin infections elsewhere.
Ann Gateley, an assistant team physician and associate professor of internal medicine at UNM's School of Medicine, said not all skin infections, even drug-resistant ones, have to be treated with antibiotics.
"Our physicians are well aware of the fact that antibiotics are over-prescribed," she said.
Gateley said many skin infections can be treated by cleaning wounds and draining puss.
Vancomycin, a special antibiotic used to treat MRSA, is usually only prescribed to patients with that specific bacterial infection.
"Antibiotics are not the key to everything and can cause great damage to the community when used indiscriminately," Gateley said.
A good example of the dangers of over-prescribing antibiotics, Gateley said, is Tuberculosis. The infection that usually attacks the lungs used to be treated with only one antibiotic, but now five are needed to kill it.
"Most bugs (bacteria), serious bugs, have developed resistance," she said.
Binder said his staff has been aware of the dangers of over-prescribing antibiotics for nearly a decade.
He said he distributed the MRSA warning to equipment managers, team doctors and trainers to keep them abreast of potential dangers to UNM athletes.
"We pride ourselves," he said. "We think we do a great job. But that doesn't mean we can't do it better."
