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Colonization with Staphylococcus aureus raises the risk for staphylococcal infection after invasive medical or surgical procedures. Screening of hospital patients and subsequent treatment to eliminate carriage before infection develops have focused on the nares, which are the primary colonization site for this pathogen (JW Infect Dis Feb 7 2006). Some people, however, are colonized only in the throat, and such individuals would be missed on routine nasal screening.
To identify risk factors for exclusive throat carriage of S. aureus, investigators in Basel, Switzerland, evaluated four groups of individuals with different estimated healthcare exposures: healthy blood donors, patients at a dental school, healthcare workers at a national trade f…