- Study using burn injuries found technique was ‘highly effective’
- Raises fresh hopes that a new treatment could be on the horizon
Mark Prigg For Dailymail.com
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A unique new way to fight multidrug-resistant bacteria has been uncovered.
Blinding them using a GM drug rather than killing them proved highly effective, a study using burn injuries has found.
It raises fresh hopes that a new treatment could be on the horizon to battle the massive outbreaks across the globe.
Blinding Pseudomonas aeruginosa, also known as Bacillus pyocyaneus, using a GM drug rather than killing them proved highly effective, a study using burn injuries has found.
BURNS IN THE US
In the United States, there are more than 1 million burn injuries and 100,000 hospitalizations annually.
Up to 75 percent of the mortality in burn patients is associated with infections.
These are particularly common in patients who suffer extensive burns – those that cover 40 percent or more of the body.
‘Rather than killing the bacteria, we blinded them so they could not find the places where they normally stick to the host (body’s) cells,’ said said Dr. Steven Wolf, Section Chief for Burns and Professor of Surgery at UT Southwestern Medical Center.
‘If bacteria cannot bind, they cannot grow.’
Dr. Wolf, one of three senior authors of the study published today in Scientific Reports, is also a former Director of the Burn Center at the U.S. Army Institute of Surgical Research in San Antonio, Texas.
‘In the United States, there are more than 1 million burn injuries and 100,000 hospitalizations annually,’ he said.
‘Up to 75 percent of the mortality in burn patients is associated with infections, which are particularly common in patients who suffer extensive burns – those that cover 40 percent or more of the body,’
The study done in rats targeted one of the most lethal pathogens: multidrug-resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa, which is found in approximately 33 percent of all burn cases and in 59 percent of extensive burns.
The researchers showed that topical application of an engineered adhesion inhibitor molecule – Multivalent Adhesion Molecule 7, or MAM7 – substantially decreased the bacterial levels in wounds in the first 24 hours after administration and prevented the spread of the infection to adjacent tissue for three more days.
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In addition, the experimental molecule aided wound healing and maintained normal inflammatory responses to the burn, the researchers report.
‘Antibiotic-resistant bacteria are an increasingly prevalent problem in the clinic and hospital, so new ways to prevent and treat infections are direly needed.
Antibiotics work by killing bacteria, which places microbes under extreme pressure to develop antibiotic resistance,’ said co-senior author Dr. Kim Orth, Professor of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry at UT Southwestern.
‘Our approach doesn’t target bacterial survival; rather it targets the microbes’ ability to damage the host – its virulence.
HOW MRSA DODGES SUPERBUGS
MRSA uses decoys to evade a last-resort antibiotic, research suggested earlier this week.
Limited treatment options exist for the deadly infection due to the bacteria having developed a resistance to antibiotics.
A scanning electron micrograph of the MRSA bacteria is see. MRSA uses decoys to evade a last-resort antibiotic, research suggested earlier this week.
One of the few drugs that can be used to fight it – known as daptomycin – only cures a third of patients, leaving many with a poor prognosis.
Decoy molecules are released by the superbug which allows them to escape being killed by the antibiotic, experts found.
‘There is no reason for the bacteria to become resistant to this approach.
‘Being unable to bind to wounded tissue is an inconvenience, and the bacteria move on,’ Dr. Orth said.
She compared the situation to the search for parking at a shopping mall.
In addition to burns, Dr. Krachler said, this strategy could work against diabetic ulcers and surgical wounds that can become infected.
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