Infectious Disease

Infectious disease physicians and clinicians writing on KevinMD about outbreaks, antimicrobial resistance, vaccines, and the ongoing challenge of preventing and treating infection. Contributors include the physicians who treat infectious disease and the public health physicians who track it. For a maintained record of what physicians have said about vaccines and vaccine refusal since 2004, see Vaccines: what physicians say, in their own words. For what clinicians wrote during the COVID-19 pandemic as it happened, see COVID-19: what physicians wrote as it happened.

The unsung heroes of the pandemic

Christine Lau, MD and Collette Williams, PhD, RN

Physician

December 12, 2020

Physicians, nurses, and respiratory therapists on the coronavirus pandemic frontlines have been hailed as heroes for putting their lives at risk to help others. While they may be the face of the hospital and those interacting directly with the patients, hospitals are full of other staff members also going above and beyond to ensure patient and staff safety during this pandemic. These individuals not only make the hospital work daily …

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The unsung heroes of the pandemic

You shouldn’t be in health care if you don’t believe in masking

Kristina Scanlan, DO

Physician

December 12, 2020

As of December 5th, there have been 281,878 total deaths and over 2,000 deaths daily. The U.S. has had a 48 percent increase in deaths compared with two weeks ago. Despite COVID-19 infections increasing exponentially, many still don’t believe in the efficacy of masking and social distancing. The most disturbing part of this is that there is still a large minority of health care practitioners who …

Social connectedness, volunteerism, and the remedy for COVID fatigue

Ashten Duncan, MD

Conditions and Diseases

December 11, 2020

The screen of my laptop brightened up as the next patient appeared in time for her telemedicine visit. The attending physician and I smiled and greeted this typically genial 73-year-old woman—let’s call her “Mariana”—as she forced a reciprocal grin. Mariana’s husband passed away from pneumonia three months prior, shortly after recovering from COVID-19. She spoke about how difficult it was not having him in her life and how her home …

A successful COVID vaccine requires more than Warp Speed

David Galinsky, MD

Conditions and Diseases

December 11, 2020

“Warp Speed” is a name that does not inspire confidence. It is a politically inspired slogan, not a serious name for a campaign to save lives. It suggests speed, not carefulness. It suggests politics, not science. The success of Warp Speed is going to depend on the American public accepting the vaccine and believing that it is both safe and effective. We must not let politics interfere with this process. …

A physician’s guide to surviving COVID winter

Rada Jones, MD

Physician

December 11, 2020

If you’re in health care, this is probably your worst winter ever. Between the COVIDs, scarce resources, shutdowns, homeschooling, bureaucracy, hoaxers, and checking the in-laws’ rashes online, you must feel cooked.

You’re frustrated. Your patients die calling COVID a hoax. People refuse to wear masks. So many loved parents die alone. Bureaucrats don’t prioritize people’s lives. Even some of our own sold their soul for fame or money.

You’re tired of being …

The vaccinated and the anxious: lessons from the pandemic

Cynthia Tsai, MD

Physician

December 10, 2020

As a primary care physician, I eagerly discuss the importance of routine vaccines with my patients. My patients bring varying beliefs and opinions about vaccines to our conversations. Some of my patients share my enthusiasm, and other patients share their questions or hesitations with me that we review in greater detail together. Still, other patients share with me worries and fears about vaccines that my counseling and reassurance can only …

A tale of 2 COVID-19 trials: compassionate use vs. EUA

G. Luke Larkin, MD

Conditions and Diseases

December 10, 2020

We all need hope this holiday season, but as an experienced physician, biostatistician, and research methodologist, it is my duty to share why the encouraging vaccine results reported by pharma companies in the last month must be applauded but interpreted with caution.

Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna are both to be commended for successfully recruiting tens of thousands of subjects in a remarkably narrow window of time. As a clinical trialist who has …

The family super-spreader event: thoughts on a COVID-19 Thanksgiving

Anonymous

Conditions and Diseases

December 10, 2020

It was Black Friday, and as I held her hand, I knew that she would be dead within the hour.

My breath was stale inside my N95. The yellow isolation gown was moist and clingy, and the fogged-up goggles gave me that feeling that I was on an extended deep-sea expedition. Mrs. Carson was still occupying her bed, but really she was already gone. I had watched the respiratory rate creep …

Where are the nurses in the Transition COVID-19 Advisory Board?

Yoo Jung Kim, MD

Health Policy

December 10, 2020

In November, President-elect Joseph Biden announced a panel of thirteen health experts as part of his Transition COVID-19 Advisory Board. The board boasts of a distinguished cohort of public health officials, scientists, and physicians. However, in reading through the board’s members’ accomplished biographies, one profession seems conspicuously absent: nurses.

Angela Phung is a family nurse practitioner in Washington state who grew up in Snohomish County, an area north of Seattle with …

Alone and frightened is the way COVID patients die

Constantine Ioannou, MD

Conditions and Diseases

December 9, 2020

I began my career in psychiatry with the desire to work with dying patients. This is an odd way to begin, but I had begun my career with interest in oncology and eventually discovered the field of psycho-oncology. After graduating, the first population I worked with was HIV infected individuals when an HIV diagnosis was a certain death sentence. The work centered on helping the individual accept their impending death …

COVID-19 and the cruel death of my mother

Christine King, CRNA

Conditions and Diseases

December 8, 2020

I am very happy to hear that the CDC decided to prioritize health care workers and long-term care residents to be the first to receive the vaccine for the COVID-19 vaccine. It is very personal to me as a health care worker and a daughter.

My mom was admitted to an assisted living/personal care home as the lockdown was hitting this past March.

Her health had been declining since September of 2019 …

COVID-19 stands on the shoulders of giants

Martin Lustick, MD

Conditions and Diseases

December 7, 2020

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, it is difficult to assimilate the global transformation that has taken place in just a few short months. As we each struggle to make sense of this life-altering event, it might help to reflect on pandemics’ history in general.

In his book, Epidemics and Society, published last year, Frank Snowden does just that.Exhibiting diligence and deep knowledge, Snowden demonstrates how pandemics have shaped history …

The critical role of physicians as pandemic truth-tellers

Philip A. Masters, MD

Physician

December 7, 2020

A guest column by the American College of Physicians, exclusive to KevinMD.

Because of their unpredictable occurrence, ubiquitous nature, and the fact that they present us with a previously unknown disease to learn and manage, pandemics have always posed a major threat to humankind. And the novel coronavirus pandemic we are currently experiencing is no …

From online education to frontline medicine

Diana Ioana Rapolti, Deepika Khanna, Vivian Jin, and Shikha Jain, MD

Medical Education

December 6, 2020

When the COVID-19 pandemic came to the United States, it required drastic changes in medical education curricula across the nation, with the majority of learning opportunities transitioning to the virtual setting. As our nation enters the ninth month of this public health crisis, it is necessary to reevaluate the current system and curate the innovative strategies that have been implemented. It is essential that the next generation of physician-scientists …

COVID-19 vaccines: Channeling the 7 habits to get from vaccines to vaccinations

Toyin M. Falusi, MD

Physician

December 6, 2020

In the U.S. and worldwide, cases, hospitalizations, and deaths from COVID-19 are surging. The health care workforce is overworked, and increasingly, more people appear to be experiencing mask fatigue. In the midst of this, there is exciting news. A few weeks ago, initial promising results from two phase 3 COVID-19 vaccine trials were released. The vaccines reportedly showed 90 to 95 percent efficacy, exceeding expectations, and providing much-needed optimism.

Vaccines are …

Dear families: We are strong, but we are tired

Debbie Moore-Black, RN

Conditions and Diseases

December 6, 2020

After 33 years as an ICU RN, I had finally decided I couldn’t do this anymore. It was my last nightshift. The last shift convinced me I had made the right decision.

The CNA and I went door to door to turn each ICU patient that was not capable of turning themselves.

ICU-06: Mrs. Thelma was 86 years old. She laid in her bed, slightly restless. Restrained. On a ventilator. NG tube …

Rusty nails and first aid: silver linings of COVID-19

Nikitha Kosaraju

Medical Education

December 5, 2020

It’s 8 a.m. on a Saturday morning in September of my second year of medical school. My brother, father, and I are chucking the used wood from our construction site into a U-Haul, prepping the wood for its ill fate of an indoor dumpster. Hundreds of miles away, many of my classmates are either still sleeping, enjoying the early morning LA sun, or perhaps even getting through their Anki cards …

Without trust, we face an uphill battle in defeating COVID-19

Hussain Lalani, MD

Physician

December 4, 2020

My annual routine of recommending the flu shot to my patients is now more critical than ever before. But when I asked one of my patients recently about getting the flu shot, she said:

“No, not really. I’m worried it will give me the flu and make me sick.”

I listened and shared some information about the flu vaccine’s benefits and how preventing hospitalizations due to the flu would help us fight …

Physicians who work themselves into the ground have nothing to be proud of

Jenny Hartsock, MD

Physician

December 4, 2020

There were recently many news articles and coverage exalting a physician for working 250 straight days during COVID. 250 days, that’s nearly 8 1/2 months without a day off.

While this physician displays dedication and caring, I don’t think we should celebrate this as an achievement. The truth is he’s working every day all day for one of two reasons. Either there is no one else, and he’s a victim of …

The potential for violence against health care workers during COVID-19

Gregory Jasani, MD

Conditions and Diseases

December 3, 2020

Recently, the FBI foiled an attempt to kidnap the governor of Michigan. The entire story reads like a Tom Clancy novel: a group of disgruntled strangers meets and organizes through chat rooms online. They conduct tactical training in the woods, do surveillance runs of the governor’s house, and even make plans to target law enforcement personnel and blow up a bridge to hamper any response to their attack. The individuals …

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