Thursday, November 16, 2006

Staphylococcus saprophyticus



Hello.
My name is S. saprophyticus.
I'm a Gram Positive cocci like my cousin S. aureus.
But I'm a little different to him, I'm called a "coagulase negative" staph, which means I react differently then him in a special test.

I get into women's bladders and urinary tracts.
I am the most common Gram Positive cause of urinary tract infection.
I'm very popular, especially in sexually active young women.

15 comments:

sharon said...

As a clinical microbiologist for almost 25 years I can't say I've EVER seen this organsim cause infection in a male. This one always causes me to ponder. If it's in sexually active women obviously the men are carriers - they just don't get infected with it. Not really fair is it? Chlamydia is much the same way. You also said "young" women which is also very true and I wonder why only young women. I don't recall seeing it on anyone over 30.

Emi said...

Love this blogg!!!!

h r o s w i t h said...

Oh, nasty microbe!

robin said...

Predictors of infection seem to be swamped by exposure to spermicide-coated condoms.

I wonder if changing contraception choices are the reason why the cute lil' s. saprophyticus tends to hang around with young women.

Unknown said...

Hello! My name's Daz, I present a radio program on a station in Sydney called 2SER www.2ser.com/programs/shows/mondayoverdrive
and would love to interview you about your blog!!! It's so great, on so many levels - I love it!
Was hoping we could have a chat on the phone sometime over the weekend... like on Sunday arvo (or Mon morning) and I could pre-record our discussion and play it on the program this coming Monday.Please send me an email to: mondayoverdrive@2ser.com and let me know whether this is possible.
Many thanks!! Daz

Anonymous said...

caused by frequent and violent sexing!

Cevastian said...

Hello I am from Argentina, i wrote in your blog the last week...do you remember me? (the beer??)
Can you tell me how did you put the image heading in your home page? Because I tried to put one in my blog and I failed.
If you don't mind could you tell me how did you do it?

Thanks!!!!

PS: Your blog is amazing, I linked it in my blog!! visit it!!! bye!!!

Anonymous said...

I love your drawings!!! I'm in vet school atm and trying to learn all these organism in such a short amount of time that your drawings really help make it much more fun...

Emma Lurie said...

hay ag, I couldn't find a way to contact your friend, his website is a dead end and I can't find any blog. Sorry.

anita (la gurisa) said...

http://cervezareiners.blogspot.com/

kisses!!!

ana

Unknown said...

Have you ever heard of the nanobugs?

Anonymous said...

I'm a pharmacist, and I must say that I have not only seen this organism in women over 30, I've HAD it as a woman in my 40s. Not only that, but I had it (at separate times) in both methicillin-resistant and methicillin-sensitive strains. It really is not a sexually- TRANSMITTED disease, but a sexually-facilitated disease, since the germ lives on your skin and rarely causes problems there. Men don't often get this bug, and rarely get the more common E.coli bladder infections, either, because of their anatomy: the germs just have a lot further to travel to get from the skin into the bladder.

Weronika Horembala said...

you have made medical school problem sets that much easier, thanks :-). It seems that their course materials never contain as much detail or information they require so we're forced to google and wikipedia many tidbits. Its then that we discover awesome people like you! The illustrations are key!

Anonymous said...

Hello Emma, you seem to know a lot about this microbe so I have a question for you. How did Staphylococcus saprophyticus get it's name? or can you suggest a link for me to find this information. It is a part of my Unknown Lab report I would appreciate your help, THANKS!

Anonymous said...

It looks like I am the exception. I am a 45 year old male, happily married for 17 years and been with the same partner for 19.5 years. Neither my wife or I have had other sexual partners during our relationship and I am my wife's one and only sexual partner. I have never had a UTI before and am rarely ever ill...I went almost 6 years without a common cold!

I contracted a UTI about 1 month back and it made me quite ill. I tried 3 different antibiotics and finally I needed to have a 4th kind which is now starting to improve things. I met a consultant and after tests he confirmed Staphylococcus saprophyticus as being the culprit. He told me I was very unlucky to get it and that he had also never known it to occur in a middle aged male, let alone a non-sexually active one! Apparently the early antibiotics were not helping at all and the infection just worsened. It does appear I have been very unlucky but I am now on the mend