Bed bugs. Just saying those two little words is enough to make the skin crawl. Seeing them in the same sentence as Yorkton Regional Health Centre is alarming. The health region is, of course, downplaying the fact that these flattened, ovoid parasites showed up at the hospital last week.
“They are a nasty nuisance, [but] bed bugs do not transmit disease,” said Sharon Tropin, Sunrise Health Region director of communications. “They are not considered a health hazard.”
That may be largely true. A fairly recent paper titled Bed Bugs in Healthcare Settings, published November 2012 in the journal Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology, notes that even though bed bugs have been found to carry infectious organisms including hepatitis B and HIV, it has never been proven, either experimentally or in clinical practice, that these insects transmit these viruses or other pathogens. Never been proven, of course, does not mean impossible.
And the paper suggests there are implications for health facilities that are not very well documented, possibly at least partly because healthcare facilities tend not to report infestations due to the negative publicity.
The authors address that stigma:
“Even though infestations are nowadays a common occurrence even in high-end hotels, laypeople still associate bed bugs with poor and unsanitary conditions.”
Unfortunately, they do make there way into even the cleanest places because they are tiny, flat and very good at hiding. Tropin said it looks like the health centre’s bugs hitched their way in on the belongings of a patient.
As soon as they were discovered, an exterminator was called in and the hospital was deemed bug-free by Monday. Still, it is concerning that they found their way in and that they are in Yorkton. While bed bugs might not pose much of a threat of transmitting infectious disease, saying they are not considered a health hazard depends a bit on your definition of health hazard.
They are bloodsuckers, which means they bite and their saliva contains proteins that dilate capillaries and prevent blood from coagulating. That can, in certain people lead to some pretty significant skin reactions and even fever and anemia. Although these reactions are unusual, they are not unheard of.
Other health hazards also occur.
“An overlooked consequence of bed bugs is the significant psychological distress that it can cause among victims,” the study states. “Insomnia, fatigue, distress, social isolation, anxiety, stigma, and persistent crawling sensations on the skin (even after elimination of bed bugs) have been described.”
The authors acknowledge it is probably impossible to absolutely prevent bed bugs, but recommend a number of risk minimization procedures.
It study concludes:
“The clinical consequences of these insects are mainly dermatologic. However, a major stigma is still present among individuals or facilities found to harbor [sic] bed bugs. Therefore, there is a need to educate healthcare workers on how to screen for and respond to bed bugs. Hospitals need to be prepared for this pest by implementing policies before infestations arise.
“Additionally, further research is needed to determine the role played by bed bugs and other arthropods in the horizontal transmission of pathogenic bacteria, as well as the role that various types of materials used for hospital furniture play in increasing the propensity of infestations.”
We know the Yorkton hospital had traps in place for early detection of an infestation, which worked. And, we applaud the health region’s quick action in dealing with it. It appears they have a pretty good reactive policy in place.
We hope they will review their proactive practices as well in order to ensure everything possible is being done to prevent a recurrence at the hospital or infestations at other facilities.
Whatever bed bugs are not, Tropin was correct in saying they are nasty.
