However, the latest development
>is that the boy has been diagnosed with MRSA. Now the mother has questions
>about kangarooing the girl after she put the boy to breast; what about co
>bedding after discharge; how long does she need to maintain precautions
etc.

MRSA is contact and droplet transmitted.  I'm just extrapolating from our
practices in the SICU, but I would think that if she washed the parts of
her body that came in contact with her baby boy simply with soap and
water, she should be fine to kangaroo-care the baby girl.  She should also
wear a mask when interacting with the baby boy.

After discharge, there are two possibilities.  Either the baby boy will be
free of MRSA (can document by 2 negative culture results (usually nasal
swab) when not febrile or on antibiotics), in which case there should be
no worry, or he may remain colonized, in which case his doctors could
consider mucipiron to eliminate the colonization.  I don't know if that is
used in infants, though.  Regardless, the babies will be in contact after
discharge enough so that cosleeping will not affect the risk of
transmission, and if the baby girl does "catch" it, it will probably be
only a colonization.  If she ever had a staph infection, she would be at
higher risk for it being MRSA (methycillin-resistant staph aureus) but it
wouldn't necessarily cause her to become sick more readily.

Shannon McElearney, MD
Research Fellow, Dept. of Surgery (Surgical Infectious Diseases Research
Laboratory)
University of Virginia
(and would not be surprised if I was MRSA+)

             ***********************************************

To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail
To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest)
To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet
All commands go to [log in to unmask]

The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(R)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html