Re: My cat tested positive for c.diff

[mugyver]

ok, now this has stirred up some thoughts.

Since I do technical suport for a living, my entire life is spent on the internet researching etc. and now that i'm on night shift with almost no human interaction, I find myself with even more time.

I can understand the difficulties involving the cat both morally and logically, but that puts me in a bit of a spot. I don't have a cat, but I do have 2 ferrets, a snake, a bearded dragon and my girlfriend has 2 dogs.

This scares me because I'm finally realizing that I could have passed the cdiff on to other people in so many ways. I didn't know I had cdiff (well I thought I did but I'm speaking clinically proven) for atleast a week or two. During that time I visited my girlfriends house on numerous occasions.

Should I now have all of these animals tested?

and if its that simple to pass cdiff on to them, what about inatimate objects. Handles, door knobs, carpets, couches, keyboards, car seats, car doors.

I'm sure you see what I'm getting at.

and even still, can cdiff spores be expelled via flatulence?

I mean, considering the most of us are quite gasey, what are the chances that I could transfered cdiff that way?

or infact another thing that kind of bothers me is considering the following.

Dust is dead skin cells for most part. So is it not possible that although its gross to think about it, we may go to the bathroom, and althought we wash our hands thouroughly (sp?) we happen to graze our pants with our wrist. The skin cells get on your wrist and then while your typing at work, it falls onto the keyboard, then someone uses your keyboard or anything else.

YOu see what I'm getting at?

I'm really trying not to become OCD over this ordeal, but I'm scared here.

I guess what I'm getting at is this.

Theres plenty of ways to transfer the spores, but worrying about them isn't helping me.

In situations where relapse or reinfection occurs without a good reason, ok maybe I'll start test all the animals etc. such as in the circumstances I'm Re: to.

but if I worry about this stuff I'm going to hurt myself and cause unneeded stress.

I mean yea, I can dissinfect my phone at work, possibly my keyboard, but theres no way for me to disinfect everything I've touched and am possibly going to touch in the future.

Ok, I'm rambling, but as far as I'm concerned, even breathing is dangerous, but I'm going to keep doing it, less I can grow gills and live under water.

mayeb this should be moved to the rant section, I'm not sure.

[Allison]

Mugyver,

"Should I now have all of these animals tested?"

NO

"Theres plenty of ways to transfer the spores, but worrying about them isn't helping me."

Then don't worry, or obsess...seriously. Transmission risk can never ever be zero, and your responsibility for it ends with good basic hygiene. Disinfect the bathroom, wash your hands often and well, and don't fret about the rest. Remember, folks are exposed to cdiff all the time...it's very easy to "pass" back and forth, especially for non-hand washers. That does not mean those who aquire the bacteria and or spores will get sick. They are at higher risk if they have underlying disease, take antibiotics, are elderly, or immunocompromised.

So chill! I agree it can be detrimental to stress about things beyond your control. It's not like you are a plague, and it remains very uncommon for those around cdiffers (in the community) to get ill.

[mugyver]

I couldn't agree with you more, but one other thing that I keep getting confused about is.

If I transfered the spores to my pet, and then I am "cured", my pet could still have the spores but I would need to be on an antibiotic or something for the risk to really still be there for me to have it transfered back to me and infect me again.

Or am I missing something.

[Allison]

That's right.
To date, there has been no established transmission risk between animals and people....not like the more well known risks. That doesn't mean it might not be there, but you could get cdiff again after you're "cured" because of a number of risk factors. Owning pets is not high on the list of those factors, it's just another avenue that epidemiologists must explore.

I dislike statements in some of the literature when additional information is not available within the context of the articles. Things like, "Puppies are known to carry c. difficile, and that may be a source of transmission". etc, may be alarming to folks when actually, we've known for a long time that animals harbor cdiff, just like us. Human infants could be considered to be a huge resovoir...nearly all of them have cdiff as part of their indigenous flora, and they will "lose" it in time. Yet those who spend alot of time around infants are not necessarily at a higher risk...not without other important factors.