Youth sent home for staph

Scott Teague
The Union-Recorder

May 08, 2008 12:14 am

— A child was sent home for the duration of his illness Tuesday after Georgia College Early College staff learned he had a staph infection.
Kilpatrick Hall on Georgia College & State University’s campus houses the school and it was scrubbed down with bleach early Wednesday morning before classes began.
The infection was discovered on the GCEC student’s leg and school staff were notified by the boy’s mother of his illness after school had let out for the day Tuesday, Camille Daniel-Tyson, GCEC director, said.
“The building has been cleaned thoroughly. We’re in contact with the boy’s mother, and he’s doing better,” Daniel-Tyson said. “There have been no other reported incidents.”
Early College staff spoke with students about the incident during school Wednesday, the director said.
Staph, or staphylococcus aureus, is a common bacteria, but recently anti-biotic-resistant strains have cropped up and caused fear in schools about contamination.
“Some people get freaked out because staph does on rare occasions get into a person’s blood or bones and can result in death,” Alice Loper, Director of Student Health Services at GCSU, said. “Most of the time it can be treated very easily.”
The GCEC student doesn’t have the resistant strain, Daniel-Tyson said, and is staying at home taking his prescribed medications.
“He won’t be back until I get a note from his doctor that gives him clearance,” the director said.
Staph infections often appear as boils or pustule lesions, and usually are drained and the patient given anti-biotics, Loper, a family nurse practitioner, said. Anyone with a draining wound should keep it covered as skin-to-skin contact is the usual culprit for spreading the illness, she said.
When the boil or pustule appears, it is sore and patients can mistake it for something very different, Loper said.
“Frequently, we have people that think they have a spider bite, even though they don’t recall being bitten or having seen a spider,” Loper said. “A lot of times, those wounds turn out to be staph infections.”

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