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.
