HIV and ID Observations

October 9th, 2016

Why Guessing An ID/HIV Doctor’s Political Affiliation Is Easy

One of our medical school’s most beloved teachers gives a wonderful lecture on how to give an effective presentation. He offers many invaluable tips for a successful talk, such as 1) Show up early; 2) Know your audience; 3) Don’t read your slides; 4) Never include a slide that you need to preface by saying, “I know you can’t […]

---

October 2nd, 2016

“Brink of HIV Cure” ID Link-o-Rama

There, that title got your attention, didn’t it? Anyway, this HIV cure news thing and a few other ID/HIV topics to contemplate while buying your pumpkin, celebrating the New Year in October, or shaking your head that all the stores seem to be putting out their Christmas stuff already. I mean, come on — it’s not even Halloween! Are […]

---

September 25th, 2016

Is There a Hospitalist “Bounce-Back” to ID?

The New England Journal of Medicine recently published two outstanding pieces on hospitalists, and they had pretty much diametrically opposing perspectives. Both should be required reading for anyone practicing medicine, and indeed anyone who might know — or be — a patient in a U.S. hospital one day. In short, everyone. But since you may not have time, let me […]

---

September 18th, 2016

Ten Years After Landmark HIV Testing Guidelines, How Are We Doing? Specifically in Emergency Departments?

In the late 1990s, a patient was admitted to our hospital with HIV-associated PCP. He had advanced AIDS, a CD4 cell count < 100, and was sick enough to require a temporary stay in our ICU. Those clinical details aren’t so remarkable — “late” diagnoses of HIV still happen, and happened even more back then. What’s […]

---

September 11th, 2016

Poll: More on Morgans, and Vote on Your Favorite Cartoon Caption

During my last post on the new HIV testing algorithm, I mentioned that I’d recently met a doctor named “Morgan” for the first time. I also provided actual data why this might be an unusual name for a doctor today, but, rarity notwithstanding, we should anticipate more examples of “Morgan —-, MD” soon. At the end of […]

---

September 4th, 2016

The Most Common Question About the New HIV Testing Algorithm, Answered

A primary care doctor in the Boston area recently emailed me this question: Hi Paul, A 28yo woman had a positive 4th gen +Ag/Ab assay, but a negative HIV-1/2 differentiation assay and negative HIV viral load. She had no signs of acute HIV, but is not using condoms with her partner, whose HIV status she doesn’t know. We repeated the test […]

---

August 27th, 2016

ID Cartoon Caption Contest #1 Winner — and a New Contest for the End of Summer

All blogs worth the price of admission have a sidebar, and this one is no exception. Critical components include (but are not limited to) the following: The Option to Subscribe — Go ahead, you know you want to. It’s right over there to the right. Just enter your email address and click subscribe — no username, password, or […]

---

August 19th, 2016

Pre-Vacation Scramble

If you search “Are vacations good for you?,” you’ll find overwhelming support for time off. It’s as if journalists and the travel industry were in cahoots, together trying to urge us to take vacations, the longer or more frequent the better. Hey, I get it. Time to reconnect with family and friends, to recharge those batteries, to get a […]

---

August 15th, 2016

Just Wondering: Quick ID Questions to Ponder On a Hot Summer Day

On a lazy, brutally hot summer day, here are some more “quick questions” to think about as you hope for a cool breeze to bring relief from the stultifying (love that word) heat: How soon will we be able to look back at contact precautions for MRSA and VRE and laugh at our folly? Are we again recommending antibiotics after incision […]

---

August 6th, 2016

Fishy, Fishy, Fishy, Fish!

I received this exciting offer recently: Re:  Fish Disease — Manuscript Invitation Dear Dr. Paul E Sax, Greetings for the good day! We gladly invite you and your colleagues to contribute the articles on the topic Fish Disease in Johnson Journal of Aquaculture and Research of Johnson Publishers. During our past two volumes, we had an excellent and fruitful cooperation, especially with our Editorial […]

---