Razi Journal of Medical Sciences

In order to determining the percentage of staph. carriers which is important in spreading to other patients and thus to the community. This descriptive and cross sectional studv was performed in 3 teaching hospitals of Iran University of Medical Sciences and Health Services.

380 health workers were chosen, separate nasal and pharyngeal swabs were taken from each person and transferred to mannitol - salt - agar media and coagulase test was performed in those samples who had

I

positive culture. The results obtained from 380 samples show that 189

(50%) nasal, 81 (21%) pharyngeal and 64(17%) nasopharyngeal samples were staph aureus carriers.

Among the three hospitals, Branks first in term of the highest number of carriers with 59% nasal and 30% pharyngeal, hospital A and Cranked second and third with 43% - 18% and 44% - 11% rates, respectively.

In hospital A the highest number of nasal carriers were in the surgical ward (67%) and the highest number of pharyngeal carriers in internal medicine (30%). In hospital B the highest number of nasal carriers in CCU (86%) and pharyngeal carriers in ophthalmology department (60%).

The average nasal carrier rate seems to be approximately 50% which is different from American reports Hospital A (43%) and C (44%) shows no difference from American figures, Hospital B with the highest carrier rate requires treatment, improved health care and more restricted infection prevention measurements.