Whooping cough breaks out

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Whooping cough breaks out: Worcester Ma

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September 30. 2006 12:00AM

Whooping cough breaks out

28 confirmed cases at St.

By Lee Hammel TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

lhammel@...

WORCESTER— Whooping cough has broken out in St. Hospital in the past

month, with 28 cases, all employees of the hospital, confirmed since Sept. 7.

The hospital is awaiting results of blood tests of another 55 people who

exhibited the symptom of a persistent cough, according to hospital spokesman

Dennis L. Irish.

So far there have been no confirmed cases in patients, although the hospital is

awaiting test results for at least one patient, he said.

The state Department of Public Health has not recommended that people avoid St.

Hospital, according to DPH spokeswoman Donna E. Rheaume. She said that

DPH has recommended the hospital send specimens to DPH’s lab for confirmation

testing and the hospital is already treating those who have been exposed to

pertussis, which is the medical name for whooping cough.

St. notified the state last week of the outbreak, Ms. Rheaume said. St.

is the only location of a current outbreak of whooping cough in the

state, she said. In a normal year, 1,000 cases of pertussis are reported to the

state, she said.

Dr. Leonard J. Morse, the city’s health commissioner, said he expects that if

there is an outbreak of pertussis, it is not confined to St. Hospital.

UMass Memorial Health Care spokesman Mark Sheldon said he does not know of any

unusual incidences of whooping cough there.

Dr. Morse said, “I don’t think the citizenry should be alarmed. I think the

citizenry should be aware of whooping cough in the community, and with the

awareness, they should seek attention from their medical professional” should

they have a persistent cough or congestion in their respiratory system.

Whooping cough frequently resolves by itself in an adult in two or three weeks

without the patient knowing that he or she has it, according to Dr.

Esposito, St. chief of medicine. In fact, even though 25,000 cases of

pertussis are diagnosed nationally, he said, the Centers for Disease Control and

Prevention estimates there are between 600,000 and 1 million cases in the United

States each year.

Although Mr. Irish said the first case at St. was reported to the city

on Sept. 8, Dr. Morse said he did not become aware there were a significant

number until Thursday. While he said communication could have been better, “I

have full confidence in what was done at the hospital and compliment them for

their management.”

Dr. Esposito said he has a sense the problem is abating at St. but

“we’ll know better next week” after test results are available.

St. has assigned extra nurses, even taking resources from its sister

hospital, MetroWest Medical Center in Framingham, to control the problem, he

said. “The health office staff is going to all units, trying to identify anyone

who has a cough, sending those people home.” Those employees who have a cough

are given a blood test and those on the unit are given prophylactic antibiotics,

he said.

Since a new vaccine for whooping cough became available in June 2005, the

hospital has urged all staff who come into contact with patients to get the

vaccine, Dr Esposito said. It previously had planned to begin those

immunizations this month, and the program in fact will get under way next month,

he said. The vaccine eliminates many of the bad reactions the previous vaccine

had and takes two weeks for the vaccine to take effect, according to Dr.

Esposito.

The hospital is redoubling its efforts to get employees who cough to report to

its health office, rather than directly to their work areas.

The hospital has identified a physician whom it believes brought the current

outbreak into the hospital. The confirmed cases are concentrated in staff

working in the operating suites, with at least one other in the gastrointestinal

endoscopy area, Dr. Esposito said.

The first symptoms of pertussis appear about seven to 10 days after a person is

exposed. People with pertussis can spread the disease starting up to two weeks

before and until three weeks after the cough starts, or until they have finished

five days of antibiotic treatment, according to DPH.

Whooping cough can be dangerous in infants. In older children and adults, the

disease is milder but can last for weeks or months.

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