Getting smell, and germs, out of all that sports gear

When Jane Bender's three sons get home from hockey practice, their gear gets dumped in the family's screen porch. ''The smell is awful," she said.

The stench subsides after a good weekly airing, and that's all most of it needs, Bender said, getting nods of agreement from a group of hockey moms sitting through a practice last week at Norfolk Arena.

But some people are getting more wary nowadays about the dirty gear, citing cases of antibiotic-resistant staph infections that have cropped up among sports teams in the past few years.

Such infections have already made a local appearance. Two Wayland High School football players were hospitalized with infections last fall.

''It was a wake-up call for us," said the school's athletic director, Martha Jamieson.

Although telling players to clean their gear is as much a part of a coach's spiel as ordering a good night's sleep before a game, the message may not register with youngsters, Jamieson said.

''Now we wash the wrestling mats and clean the fitness room every day," she said. She's also inquiring whether the company that reconditions and certifies the football team's helmets during the off-season actually cleans them.

Staphylococcus aureus bacteria typically cause minor skin infections that appear as pimples or boils. But they can also cause infections in the blood, bones, and lungs, Centers for Disease Control officials say. And they are worried that some of the bacteria over the past 50 years have become resistant to antibiotics.

The bacteria are almost always spread by direct physical contact or by touching objects, including towels and sports equipment, that have been contaminated by someone else with the infection, the CDC's website says.

Wayland High's school physician, Dr. Simone Mordas, believes the high school's cases were brought home by two athletes who attended an out-of-state wrestling camp before football season started. Whether the virus was harbored on dirty sporting equipment is unknown, she said, adding that steps taken have prevented further infection. She downplays the severity of the outbreak.

''The locker room at the high school was not the greatest," she said. ''Since then, a lot more has been done to sterilize things."

Mike Weiner, an Ashland resident, is hoping to help out. He bought an industrial washing machine last year, set up an equipment cleaning business called MetroWest Clean Gear Corp. in Marlborough, and is trying to drum up business by educating athletic directors and parents about the need for clean equipment.

He visited Wayland just days before the outbreak, and as one of very few businessmen in the area actively seeking dirty sporting goods to clean, he came away with the job of washing the entire Wayland team's football gear in mid-season.

Weiner says the smell of the sports equipment should tell people something.

''The smell is caused by decaying bacteria, mold, and fungus," he said.

His washing machine is 7 feet tall, 4 feet deep, and 6 feet wide. It can take eight full sets of hockey gear, including skates, in one load. As father of a hockey-playing high school student, he's surprised that nobody really thought of doing this before.

''We wash our shirts when they're not even dirty, but kids will wear their football gear five or six times a week and don't do anything to it for five months during the season," he said.

So far, business has been sluggish as Weiner tries to overcome resistance from people who, he says, have come to accept the grunge as part of the game.

Bender, of Walpole, was among a group of hockey moms from the KP Walpole Youth Hockey program who had many tales of dirty equpment. Their players skate at the Norfolk rink.

Gail Bolduc of Wrentham said helmets can get so bad that, when her kids take them off, ''Their hair can smell like foreign matter."

Natick High athletic director, Tom Lamb, who serves on the Wellness Committee of the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association, said the staph infections haven't been widespread enough to merit special discussion by his committee. But the chances of infection are known.

''Everyone has been in the business long enough to know the pitfalls of infection," Lamb said.

Dr. Mark Drapkin, associate chief of infectious disease services at Newton-Wellesley Hospital, said the chance of getting a staph infection from equipment is low, but the bacteria can live on surfaces long enough to be picked up by another person. An important preventive step can be as simple as frequent hand washing, he said.

''It's a hot issue right now," Drapkin said, noting that the infection was previously associated with patients in hospitals but is now seen in otherwise healthy people, including many children.

Most people don't have to worry about such infections, he said. ''But if it gets into a team, that's different, because of the close contact teammates are likely to have with each other."

Alison O'Leary Murray may be reached at amurray@globe.com.