A Virginia Commonwealth University study of surgical scrubs treated to resist MRSA showed the specially-treated garments were less likely than regular scrubs worn by health care workers to be contaminated with staph bacteria.
The small study enrolled 32 health care workers, who wore specially-treated scrubs for four weeks, switched back to regular scrubs, then repeated the four-week-on, four-week-off regimen for 16 weeks.
From week to week, the health care workers did not know if they had the study scrubs or regular scrubs. The study also monitored the workers’ hand-washing regimens.
The researchers didn’t find any differences in the levels of MRSA on employees’ skins. But they did find differences in MRSA contamination of the clothing they wore. In particular, when they took swabs from the clothing, they found less MRSA on the study scrubs’ leg cargo pocket and abdominal pockets when compared to regular scrubs.
The research was funded by Vestex Technologies, a company that makes antimicrobial garments in addition to other products. The researchers noted that the results cannot be broadly generalized because the study was small and took place in a single hospital unit.
(This has been a breaking news update. Check back for more details as they become available.)
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