Tom Brady's Knee Infection - Is This the Tragedy We've Expected?

I hope that title got your attention -- because it's a sad commentary on what patient empowerment experts have been waiting for. Sadly, Tom Brady, injured quarterback for the New England Patriots may be our poster boy.

For many years, patient advocates and health experts who understand these things have been calling attention to hospital acquired infections such as MRSA and C.Diff. And what many of us have said for years is that it was going to take a tragedy before people would pay attention to the horrors and the outcomes of these infections in order to demand that something to be done to stop them.

If this is all new to you (perhaps you found this blog post because of your interest in the New England Patriots or major league football?) then here's a primer:

• MRSA, C.Diff, VRE and others are acquired mostly by hospital patients who have weakened immune systems (very sick or elderly) or have open wounds, such as people who have been in an accident, have been injured in someway, or have had surgery. Yes -- like Tom Brady.
• Hospital acquired infections are considered superbugs: there is no antibiotic that kills them because each time a new antibiotic is developed, the germs figure out how to overcome it. It's Darwin at his best.
• Millions of Americans are infected by these pathogens every year. More than 100,000 people die from them.

I'm not a big football fan and I don't have a team I follow closely. But the tragedy of Tom Brady's infection, which will take months to treat and -- I'm sorry to say -- has a good chance of damaging his knee forever and even puts him at further risk -- may be the horror we advocates have expected which will call attention to this problem of infections.

They are preventable. Hospitals and their personnel know this. So is this what it's going to take to make those hospital personnel who can stop these infections pay attention?

I wish Mr. Brady Godspeed and good healing. I hope when this is all over, he's not our poster boy afterall.

Learn more:

• Hospital-acquired infections and their prevention
• The National Quality Forum's List of Never Events
• Medicare (followed by private insurance) will no longer pay for hospital-acquired infections.

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