The first time I had a patient with herpes simplex virus infection of the brain was while I was doing my Infectious Diseases (ID) fellowship. It was a woman who had neurosurgery to remove a brain tumor. She was more than a week into her recovery from surgery but suddenly one day, she was confused […]
Scared out of her wits! The patient with the unusual yeast infection
Have you ever been scared out of your wits by something a doctor told you? I was asked to see a patient some time ago with a bad rash. She had been hospital for about 2 weeks already, getting 2 antibiotics for a spine infection. This was a woman of almost 90 years old (though […]
Zika virus infection – what we know so far
I am frequently asked, when next am I visiting home. My answer is always, no time soon. My home is Antigua, an island in the Eastern Caribbean. The truth is, since news of the Zika virus outbreak in the Caribbean and Latin America last year, and particularly the suspected link between Zika virus infection and […]
Why you need to complete your course of antibiotics as instructed
Those who have been following this blog for some time may have gathered that one of my pet peeves is antibiotic abuse. I am very conservative when it comes to prescribing antibiotics. However, when I think an infection is likely, I get antibiotics on board as quickly as possible. Sometimes, a few hours delay in […]