The Master-El Livejournal reports Elliot Shorter returned to the Providence VA Medical Center on March 17 for treatment of a persistent cough and chest pressure, possibly “another MRSA-type infection that is complicating his already existing cold.”

David Klaus comments: “I hope it’s not MRSA, or as it was known at my hospital, ORSA, which along with VRE and C.Diff. are the banes of modern hospitalization and long-term care, requiring patients to be contact-isolated: everyone entering the patient’s room must be gowned and gloved, which must be removed at the door upon leaving the room. (The idea is that anything you pick up in the room will be on the disposable gown/gloves, and shed with their removal at the door.) The patient must be gowned and gloved before leaving the room for therapy or any other purpose (a barrier against spreading outside their room).”

[Thanks to David for the story.]