Google Algorithm to Search Out Hospital Superbugs

Googling Yourself writes "Researchers in the UK plan to use Google's PageRank algorithm to find how super-bugs like MRSA spread in a hospital setting. Previous studies have discovered how particular objects, like doctors' neckties, can harbor infection, but little is known about the network routes by which bugs spread. Mathematician Simon Shepherd plans to build a matrix describing all interactions between people and objects in a hospital ward, based on observing normal daily activity."

Comments

Inaccurate summary

[solafide]

They're not using the PageRank algorithm itself, but an algorithm similar to how they conjecture Google works. In actuality, they're building a graph of interactions and finding the most linked to nodes, which is a fairly easy graph problem and nothing too exciting. It's the novelity of using this in hospitals that makes it notable. The PageRank reference is just for media attention/allowing non-compsci people to understand it, though.

maybe not, but other connections are known

[petes_PoV]

such as these "superbugs" became more prevalent when the health service oursourced ward cleaning ...... to the lowest bidder.

There's also a view that having (letting?) staff wear their uniforms outside the hospital both brings in bugs from outside the hospital and lets them out into the real world.

There are some absolutely basic things that the NHS could do, but for some inexplicable (cost related?) reasons won't do. It doesn't need high-tech investigations and it's not rocket science - just basic hygene sense.

Re:maybe not, but other connections are known

[damburger]

But that goes against the market orthodoxy of our times. Remember, public services exist only to be privatised, piece by piece. Socialised medicine doesn't work! That's why the UK has a lower infant mortality rate and higher life expectancy than the US!

Re:maybe not, but other connections are known

[Socguy]

I agree with you, it's not rocket science and it's the basic stuff we still need to work on.

I worked in a hospital and the issue of superbugs was a prominent one. The plain fact of the matter is that superbugs are not a large danger outside of a hospital. They rarely infect healthy individuals precisely because they are healthy, instead they infect those whose immune systems are already compromised and those people are disproportionately found in hospitals and other clinical settings. Allowing staff to wear hospital clothing from home to work and back again shouldn't be a problem (assuming that they proceed directly to work and home from work and don't go to a daycare before work or a nursing home after) because hospitals are far dirtier than the outside world.

Granted, this is interesting research, but ultimately it will do nothing to stop the spread of superbugs in the hospital setting because doctors and nurses who should know better don't take the time to sterilize themselves properly between interactions with patients. Time and time again I would witness doctors pop in on a patient infected with MRSA or something else and fail to put on a mask or gown up, because they were only going to be there for a minute, then they would move on to the next patient. Worse they would have all their residents in tow, who were now learning the same behaviour. And it's not just doctors, some nurses were doing it as well. Granted 95% of the time most healthcare workers did take the basic precautions 95% of the time, but that is simply not good enough. Until 100% of hospital staff observes basic precautions 100% of the time, this line of research will be interesting but ultimately fruitless in the fight against the spread of superbugs.

Re:We're breeding them every day

[Anonymous Coward]

"anitbacterial" dishwashing liquid, in this context, is marketing-speak for "soap".

Re:backwards

[Arthur B.]

These are very interesting thoughts, and I do share your belief that hospital should become more stringent in the future.

I'd just like to point out that "it would create jobs" is no argument at all though. In fact if it didn't create any jobs, it would mean hospitals like these rained from heaven and we would all be better off. The least jobs it creates, the cheaper it is to have, the better it is.

How antibacterials work - It is NOT just soap

[arete]

"Antibacterial" household products contain something different than soap. What thing that is, varies.

I'm not a chemist or a doctor. And I assume that if this is mistaken in any way, someone will correct me, since this is /. after all.

For household use you don't need antibacterial agents to effectively wash your hands - because the act of actual abrasion with the surface-tension eliminating properties of soap removes most things from your skin. For the most part, your hands don't harbor a lot of problems IN the surface, because your body is busy killing that.

In my opinion, there are also two major classes of these antibacterial agents - which I'll classify as "simple" and "complex" To my knowledge, it's extremely difficult and rare for bacteria to become resist to "simple" antibacterial agents.

Simple antibacterial agents are things that kill everything. Like bleach (e.g. Chlorox), or high concentrations of alcohol (e.g. Glass Plus). To a lesser extent vinegar, ammonia, salt... These things are not necessarily good for people, but people are really big and can avoid drinking them in really high doses... but they're still really bad for bacteria etc to swim completely in and they get annihilated, because these things basically just melt cell walls.

For the most part these are quite safe to clean with... they don't especially build up in your system, so as long as you never get a super high dose, usually by breathing or drinking it, you're safe. But I don't recommend you swim in bleach, get it in your eyes, and drink it either. Those example cleaners are relatively harmless in most controlled cleaning situations - but there are plenty of options in this category that aren't - like strong acids - we just don't usually put them in consumer cleaners in high doses.

So I have no objection to, say, a little bleach being added to surface cleaners.

The antibiotics you take orally are wildly different, and must be complex. They can't be TOO bad for you, or they'd be rat poison and not a drug. So they try to attack something bacteria-cell specific that human cells are immune to. But bacteria operate in a range of ways, so often this only works on some bacteria. And they mutate... so the more specific and narrow the antibiotic is, the easier it is for the bacteria to become immune. The broader it is, the more likely it hurts you.

Some companies - because it's what the uneducated consuming public wants - are putting vaguely these kind of agents in household cleaning products. Not EXACTLY the same drugs we're taking orally. But chemicals that have narrow, complex effects on bacteria, which probably encourage mutation. Those mutations may or may not impact the effectiveness of current or future drugs.

HOWEVER, as much as I think antibacterial hand soap is pretty high on the list of evils, it's not NEARLY as bad as the number of people who merely don't finish the antibiotics they were prescribed. Those people are ruining the world.

Re:backwards

[Anonymous Coward]

-And we should not be putting antibiotics in feedstocks so that animals grow fatter quicker (and every bug becomes resistant in a hurry).

-And people on antibiotics should finish their treatment even if they start feeling better early.

-And antibiotics should not be presribed in situations that they don't help (that happens a lot to get rid of whiney 'customers' quickly).

-And hospitals should spend more money on cleaning staff who know what they are doing.