HIV and ID Observations

August 27th, 2017

Who’s Most Likely to Leave an Out-of-Office Message While on Service?

Once upon a time, I used being on service as a convenient excuse for not writing very much — or certainly, not writing very much of importance — on this site. The on-service time also allowed me to poke gentle fun at my colleagues, several of whom always turn on an “out-of-office” message when they attend on the inpatient […]

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August 20th, 2017

Two Quick Thoughts Inspired by Inpatient ID Consults, and An Inspirational Baseball Poster

A couple of quick thoughts for those of us doing inpatient care these days: Thought One:  Is daptomycin now preferred over vancomycin in most clinical settings?  It’s taken a while, but we’re getting there — close to that Gladwelllian “tipping point”.  Allow this recap of vancomycin’s problems: The growing recognition that higher drug levels — […]

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August 13th, 2017

Dog-Related Infectious Diseases as an Excuse to Show Pictures of Dogs

For proof that we’re not like other human members of the planet, when ID doctors think of dogs, it sometimes brings to mind one or more of following associations: Gastroenteritis due to Campylobacter jejuni. No, there’s nothing cuter in the world than a puppy — but remember that these little critters are particularly predisposed to symptomatic (and asymptomatic) campylobacter […]

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August 6th, 2017

Have We Reached the End of HCV Drug Development?

Two new HCV regimens gained FDA approval recently, bringing us closer to the end of this extraordinary phase of drug development. Think about it — has there ever been a more spectacularly rapid improvement in treatment of anything? If so, please let me know what that is. Remember, as recently as early 2013, highly toxic interferon-based therapy (with ribavirin and […]

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