Slashdot Mirror
E-nose Sniffs Out Nasty Resistant Bacteria
geekroot's dad writes "There have been several tries for an Electronic nose that seek out various airborne elements - they can find cancer, monitor recycled air for NASA and
find nasty bacteria better than lab tests. Now as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MSRA) becomes a problem not only in hospitals but in everyday life some British scientist have built a super nose to find the 'little buggers'."
As is often the case, e-nose researchers tend to focus more on detection than discrimination. If this thing generates too many false alarms, it'll be useless.
Staph bacteria is something that's very common on the outside of people. The article itself places the number at 30%, and that number is much higher for kids who handle unsanitary things all the time don't wash their hands as often as they should. It's not an epidemic because it has to enter your blood through an open wound. Most adults simply don't cut themselves very often (with the exception of shaving, but that's sanitized anyhow), so the majority of staph infections are in kids.
The problem with this device is when would you use it? Either you're waiting for mom to bring in the kid after you already think she has a staff infection, or you're sniffing everyone at random. If mom thinks it's a staff infection, the kid probably does have staph bacteria on him, but that doesn't get you any closer to knowing if that's the infection. If you're sniffing everyone at random, you're really only picking out the people that don't wash their hands enough and making them pay for it with extra (almost certainly unnecessary) testing.
In either case, who's celebrating this as some kind of new breakthrough that's going to revolutionize the health care industry? This really makes me wonder if this device is more for revenue than for health screening. "Hey, it looks like you tested positive for a possible staff infection. I'm sure your insurance will cover some extra tests."
Years ago one of my med school teachers taught us to sniff wounds for infection. He said that with a bit of practice you could quickly learn to discriminate infections and it's true.
Even now I often sniff dressings for infection and I'm right most of the time. The odour of different infections are quite characteristic and you can easily tell if it's light or heavy.
Gets some funny looks at times, but I can usually beat the labs by 24 hours. My students think I'm a bit odd, but I notice that now they too take a surreptitious sniff and then pronouce wisely!
Long live the Mark I nose.....