Infection Control in the Multidrug-Resistant Era: Tending the Human Microbiome

Increasing understanding of the normal commensal microorganisms in humans suggests that restoring and maintaining the microbiome may provide a key to preventing colonization and infection with multidrug-resistant organisms (MDROs). Intact communities of commensals can prevent colonization with MDROs...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inClinical infectious diseases Vol. 54; no. 5; pp. 707 - 713
Main Authors Tosh, Pritish K., McDonald, L. Clifford
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Oxford Oxford University Press 01.03.2012
Subjects
Animals
Antibiosis
Antibiotics
Antimicrobial agents
Antimicrobials
Biofilms
Biological and medical sciences
Colonization
Commensals
Competition
Disease control
Drug resistance
Drug Resistance, Multiple
Drug therapy
Epidemiology
Health care industry
HEALTHCARE EPIDEMIOLOGY
Humans
Infection
Infection Control
Infections
Infectious diseases
Medical sciences
Metagenome - physiology
Microbial colonization
Microbiota
Microorganisms
Public Health
Translational Medical Research
Prevention
Human
Infection
Check
Multiple resistance
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Summary:Increasing understanding of the normal commensal microorganisms in humans suggests that restoring and maintaining the microbiome may provide a key to preventing colonization and infection with multidrug-resistant organisms (MDROs). Intact communities of commensals can prevent colonization with MDROs through both competition for space and resources and the complex immunologic and biochemical interactions that have developed between commensal and host over millennia. Current antimicrobials, however, exert tremendous collateral damage to the human microbiome through overuse and broadening spectrum, which has likely been the driving force behind the introduction and proliferation of MDROs. The future direction of infection control and anti-infective therapy will likely capitalize on an expanding understanding of the protective role of the microbiome by (1) developing and using more microbiome-sparing antimicrobial therapy, (2) developing techniques to maintain and restore indigenous microbiota, and (3) discovering and exploiting host protective mechanisms normally afforded by an intact microbiome.
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ISSN:1058-4838
1537-6591
DOI:10.1093/cid/cir899