Researchers implemented daily chlorhexidine bathing for 16 months in a medical ICU with MRSA endemicity after a 14 month control period. They used regression analysis to find the affect of the bathing on MRSA acquisition, and they also measured MRSA chlorhexidine susceptibility with polymerase chain reaction tests.
They found a significant reduction in the incidence density of MRSA in the ICU.
“Daily chlorhexidine bathing resulted in a significantly decreasing trend of MRSA acquisition rates irrespective of increased MRSA prevalence rates in the medical ICU,” the study concludes. “There was no shift of chlorhexidine-resistant MRSA strains.”
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