Reese and Betts' a practical approach to infectious diseases

PREFACE

When our chief resident was asked what he thought of Reese and Betts' A Practical Approach to Infectious Diseases, he responded, “It is logically organized and thoroughly referenced. It provides a comprehensive, up-to-date guide for diagnosing and managing common and obscure infectious diseases. It is an invaluable resource for any resident or practicing physician.â€‌

This book was written to provide helpful information on infectious disease problems for medical students, house officers, community practicing physicians, and other health care practitioners such as hospitalists, nurses, and infection control officers.

Reese and Betts' A Practical Approach to Infectious Diseases uses an outline format to make the information readily available and succinct. This approach provides the reader with rapid access to the information that they need to find, while at the same time it leads their thinking in a logical fashion step-by-step through the management of the problem at hand. Up-to-date references are provided for readers to expand their understanding of the specific problem with which they are confronted.

The original intent of this text, when it was conceived by Dr. Richard Reese during his fellowship in infectious diseases in the late 1970's, was to answer the questions most often asked of the infectious disease consultant by the practicing physician. That philosophy is maintained in this edition. The difference between this edition and the earlier ones is that some of the questions have changed, and some quite dramatically.

This new edition provides the reader with up-to-date information in several areas: In-depth discussions of the rapidly emerging resistant gram positive, gram-negative, and mycobacterial infections, and the newest antimicrobial approach to combat these problems of resistance is discussed in detail in the respective chapters; analysis of evolving fungal infections and the new antifungal agents, some of which are not yet fully approved; an in-depth analysis of antivirals available to combat HIV infection is provided, as well as thoughtful analysis of their use in adults, in children, and in pregnant women, and will bring the generalist and the infectious diseases expert up-to-date in this field; investigational new antiretroviral agents are presented; emerging problems in bioterrorism can be found in the pneumonia and skin and soft tissue chapters; and each of the organ system chapters provides new information that has emerged since the last edition.

Whether in the intensive care unit, in the emergency department, or in the office, the practitioner can turn to this compact, yet complete, text to find the answers that he or she needs. The problem may be as complicated as a bone marrow transplant patient with fever and a new pulmonary infiltrate; or an HIV-infected patient who has failed previous regimens; or it may be as straightforward as the office patient with an upper respiratory infection or with cellulitis. The information to help the practitioner think through a logical approach to these and many other problems is provided.

An additional, and unusual, feature of this text is the inclusion of hard-to-find information on the approach to infection in the neonate, infections of the eye, use of vaccines to prevent infectious diseases problems, in-depth information on international travel, infections in transplantation patients, and management of employee health problems.

What prompted us to bring this new edition forward is the excellent response we have had from the house staff and students who have used our book previously. They have urged us to update the information and we have responded with this new edition.

We thank all of our contributors for their outstanding effort to update their contributions and Dr. Geneen Gibson, who provided the important cost information concerning antibiotics. Dr. Richard Reese was most helpful with suggestions along the way. We acknowledge Margaret Aldrich, who helped prepare portions of the text. We extend our sincere appreciation to Hal Pollard and Denise Martin of Lippincott Williams & Wilkins for helping us keep up the momentum that led to the completion of the task. Most of all, we thank our wives Sherrill, Rachel, and Stephanie, without whose patient understanding and support we could not have completed this work.