Measuring Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and vancomycin-resistant Enterococci (VRE) rates.
Lake of the Woods District Hospital posts its infection rates online on a quarterly basis. On this website, you can find information about hospital-acquired infection rates for MRSA and VRE.

What does hospital-acquired mean?
Sometimes when patients are admitted to the hospital, they can get infections. This is a hospital-acquired infection. In the case of either MRSA or VRE, this may mean that symptoms begin 72 hours after admission to the hospital. 

What is Vancomycin-resistant Enterococci (VRE)? 
Enterococci are bacteria that are normally present in the human intestines and in the female genital tract and are often found in the environment. These bacteria can sometimes cause infections. Vancomycin is an antibiotic that is often used to treat infections caused by enterococci. In some instances, enterococci have become resistant to this drug and thus are called vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE). VRE have a minimal inhibitory concentration (MIC) to vancomycin of ≥ 32 mcg/ml. They contain the resistance genes VAN-A or VAN-B. 

What are the risk factors for VRE?
Risk factors for VRE include severity of underlying illness, presence of invasive devices, prior colonization with VRE, antibiotic use and length of hospital stay.   

How is VRE transmitted?
The single most important mode of transmission of VRE in a health care setting is via transiently colonized hands of health care workers who acquire it from contact with colonized or infected patients, or after handling contaminated material or equipment. The unrecognized colonized patient presents a particular risk for transmission to other patients.

VRE Rate
The method of calculation of the VRE bacteraemia infection rate for the reporting period (on a quarterly basis) is: 

Number_of_nosocomial_patients_with_laboratory_identification_of_VRE_bacteraemia_x_100
Total number of patient days