Mortuary Microbiology Review

Exotoxin

A toxin, generally a protein, produced by a microorganism and excreted into its surrounding medium.

Sporicides

Agents that kill bacterial and mold spores, can also be used during the process of terminal disinfection of embalming instruments and equipment.

General Infection

An infection that becomes systemic.

Buboes

An inflamed, swollen, or enlarged lymph mode exhibiting suppuration, occurring commonly after infective disease due to absorption of infected material.

Opportunist

An organism that exists as part of the normal flora but that can become pathogenic under certain conditions.

Primary Infection

An original infection from which a second one originates.

Fomites

Any inanimate object to which infectious material adheres and can be transmitted.

Disinfection

The destruction of vegetative pathogens by chemical or physical means by applying the disinfectant to an inanimate object.

Steam under pressure

The most effective means of controlling microbial growth because pressure, temperature, and length of exposure can be controlled.

Reservoir

The natural habitat of a disease-causing organism.

Host

The organism from which a microorganism obtains nourishment.

Antisepsis

The process by which microbial growth is inhibited on living tissue to prevent infection. Destruction of vegetative pathogens on living tissue.

Sterilization

The process of completely removing or destroying all life-forms, endospores, or their products on or in a substance.

Formalin

37% formaldehyde by mass and 40% by volume used as a disinfectant.

Lipase

A bacterial enzyme that acts with the oils and fats secreted by the sebaceous glands allowing the bacteria to colonize in the skin.

Coagulase

A bacterial enzyme that causes blood to clot by converting fibrinogen into fibrin.

Hyaluronidase

A bacterial enzyme that penetrates the body's connective tissues, permitting the easy spread of infection throughout the body.

Antigen

A foreign substance that stimulates the formation of antibodies that interact specifically with it.

Ultraviolet (UV) light

A form of nonionizing radiation that can effectively control the growth of microorganisms placed directly in its path.

Mechanical Vector

A living organism or an object that is capable of transmitting infections by carrying the disease agent on its external body part or surface.

Pathogen

A microorganism capable of producing disease.

Toxin

A poisonous substance of plant, animal, bacterial, or fungal origin.

Tincture

A solution of iodine and alcohol that is primarily used as an antiseptic. It does not kill endospores.

Benzalkonium Chloride

A topical antiseptic used on the skin before surgery, in nasal sprays, and as a preservative in eye drops.

Eschar

An anthrax lesion characterized by a central mass of necrotic tissue surrounded by inflammatory vesicles.

Biological Vectors

An arthropod vector in which the disease-causing organism multiplies or develops within the arthropod prior to becoming infective for a susceptible individual.

Glutaraldehyde

An effective disinfectant and is actually a cold chemical sterilant when activated in a 2 percent solution, which is germicidal in 10 minutes and kills endospores in 3 to 12 hours.

Focal Infection

An infection in which organisms are orginally confined to one area but enter the blood or lymph vessel and spread to other parts of the body.

Legionella Pneumophilia

Causative agent of Legionnaire's disease.

Borrelia burgdorferi

Causative agent of Lyme disease.

Mycobacterium avium

Causative agent of Mycobacterium Avium Complex.

Coxiella Burnetii

Causative agent of Q fever.

Bacillus Anthracis

Causative agent of anthrax.

Shigella species

Causative agent of bacillary dysentery.

Clostridium botulinum

Causative agent of botulism.

Vibrio Cholerae

Causative agent of cholera. The disease is characterized by a profuse and watery diarrhea.

Corynebacterium diphtheriae

Causative agent of diphtheria.

Neisseria gonorrhoeae

Causative agent of gonorrhea.

Proteus Species

Causative agent of infections in burns.

Haemophilus influenzae

Causative agent of influenzal meningitis.

Campylobacter jejuni

Causative agent of intestinal ulcers.

Leptospira

Causative agent of leptospirosis.

Leptospira interrogans

Causative agent of leptospirosis.

Iodophore

Compound of iodine and a surfactant such as a detergent that can slowly release the free iodine.

Septicemia

Condition characterized by the multiplication of bacteria in blood; commonly known as blood poisoning.

Chlorine

Disinfects water supply, sewage, pools, bedpans, toilets, and floors.

Antibodies

Glycoprotein substances developed in response to and interacting specifically with an antigen; also known as immunoglobulins.

Aldehydes

Group of organic compunds that control microbial growth by reacting with the proteins in microorganisms and altering their chemical structure.

Universal Precautions

Guidelines designed to protect workers with occupational exposure to bloodborne pathogens.

Cremation

Human remains are placed in a retort, and a temperature of about 1600 degrees F (871 degrees C) is maintained until the remains have undergone complete combustion.

Secondary Infection

Infection caused by a different organism than the one causing the primary infection.

Local Infection

Infection caused by germs lodging and multiplying at one point in a tissue and remaining there.

Fractional sterilization

Items are placed in free-flowing steam for 30 minutes on successive days.

Carbolic Acid

Joseph Lister (1827-1912) first used phenol as a disinfectant. Phenol aka carbolic acid.

Germicides

Kills a variety of different types of microorganisms, but not necessarily their spores.

Bactericides

Kills bacteria but not necessarily their spores.

Fungicides

Kills both fungi and their spores.

Thermal death point

Lowest temperature at which all microorganisms are killed in 10 minutes.

Scrubbing

Manual process by which microorganisms are removed from a surface.

Thermal death time

Minimum time it takes to kill all microorganisms present.

Hexachlorophene

Only available with a prescription, but it is an ingredient in several commercial embalming chemicals. About 450 times more effective as a germicide than phenol.

Embalming

Process of chemically treating the dead human body to temporarily disinfect, preserve, and restore an acceptable physical appearance.

True Pathogen

Real or genuine disease producing organism.

Incineration

Reduction of waste to a more manageable quantity and form, ashes. Both the vegetative bacteria and the bacterial endospore are inactivated during incineration.

Drug-fast

Resistant, as in bacteria, to the action of a drug or drugs.

Resistance

The ability of an organism to defend itself against infection and disease; the sum total of body mechanisms that interpose barriers to the progress of invasion, multiplication of infectious agents, or damage by their toxic products.

Contamination

The act of introducing disease germs or infectious material into an area or substance.

Clostridium tetani

The bacterium that causes tetanus (lockjaw).

Halogens

The six elements found in the next to the last column on the far right side of the periodic table. Fluorine, chlorine, bromine,and iodine.

Pathogenicity

The state of producing or being able to produce pathological changes and disease.

Infection

The state or condition in which the body or a part of the body is invaded by a pathogenic agent that, under favorable conditions, multiplies and produces injurious effects.

Clostridium perfringens

This enzyme breaks down red blood cells and induces some of the symptoms of gas gangrene. Tissue gas-producing anaerobic bacillus is responsible for true tissue gas (postmortem only).

Decimal reduction time

Time in minutes it takes to kill 90% of the present microorganisms.

Alcohols

Widely used disinfectants that control microbial growth by denaturing proteins and by dissolving lipids in the cell membrane of microorganisms.

Salmonella Enteritidis

Causative agent of salmonellosis.

Streptococcus pyogenes

Causative agent of scarlet fever.

Helicobacter pylori

Causative agent of stomach ulcers.

Treponema pallidum

Causative agent of syphilis.

Straphylococcus aureus

Causative agent of toxic shock syndrome.

Mycobacterium tuberculosis

Causative agent of tuberculosis.

Francisella Tularensis

Causative agent of tularemia (rabbit fever).

Salmonella typhi

Causative agent of typhoid fever.

Rickettsia Typhi

Causative agent of typhus fever. Reservoir. Rodents. Transmission. Flea bite.

Bordetella Pertussis

Causative agent of whooping cough.

Quaternary Ammonium Compounds

Chemical disinfectants and antiseptics that damage cellular membranes and denature microbial proteins. A group of disinfectants that are deactivated in the presence of soap and includes benzalkonium chloride.

Cresols

Commonly used in mortuary disinfectants because they work well in the presence of other organic compounds.

Attenuation

Dilution or weakening of the virulence of a microorganism, reducing or abolishing pathogenicity.

Endotoxin

Bacterial toxin confined within the body of a bacterium freed only when the bacterium is broken down; found only in gram negative bacteria.

Toxemia

Blood distribution throughout the body of poisonous products of bacteria growing in a focal or local site, thus producing generalized symptoms.

Rickettsia Rickettsii

Causative agent of Rocky Mountain spotted fever. Reservoir. Rodents. Transmission. Tick bite.

Listeria monocytogenes

Causative agent of listeriosis.

Streptococcus agalacitae

Causative agent of meningitis in newborns.

Klebsiella pneumoniae

Causative agent of nosocomial respiratory infections.

Streptococcus pneumoniae

Causative agent of otitis media (about 35% of cases)

Yersinia Pestis

Causative agent of plague. Reservoir. Rodents. Transmission. Flea bites.

Insecticides

Kills insects.

Larvicides

Kills larvae, which are the wormlike forms of newly hatched insects.

Dry heat

Kills microorganisms by coagulating the proteins they contain and breaking hydrogen bonds within the microorganisms.

Virucides

Kills viruses.