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Infectious Pathology and Antimicrobials Juan Pablo Horcajada

Over the last twenty years, the knowledge acquired on infectious diseases has developed extraordinarily. No other area within the field of medical sciences has grown so much and so fast. Nosocomial infection, including prosthetic infections, multidrug-resistant germs, the optimized use of antimicrobial drugs, AIDS, tuberculosis, infections in transplant recipients and oncologic patients, new immunodepressed patients, infectious diseases in migrant people, and infectious pathologies in travellers have joined the more classical community infections, increasing the knowledge on these and thus improving and extending the lives of millions of people. Infectious diseases are the second most common cause of death in the world and the first cause of loss of life adjusted by disabilities. In Spain, infectious diseases account for 20 to 40% of acute and chronic problems of hospital patients.

The Infectious Pathology and Antimicrobial Therapy Research Group at IMIM is geared towards the clinical and epidemiological study of the most prevalent or transcendental infectious diseases in the community, such as HIV, pneumonia, urinary tract infections and tuberculosis. It also focuses on infections related to the provision of healthcare, including those caused by multidrug-resistant microorganisms, osteoarticular and prosthetic infections, and bacteraemia. A large proportion of the research done by the group focuses on antimicrobial therapy with new and old antibiotics, studying the pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of these drugs and also studying new antimicrobial therapy strategies through clinical trials and observational studies carried out in the group, as main researchers, and collaborators in projects run by the group or multicenter projects.

Lines of research

1.- Nosocomial and community infections

• Infections from multidrug-resistant microorganisms
  • Epidemiology, clinical study and treatment of infections caused by multidrug-resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa
  • Colistin resistance in Pseudomonas aeruginosa
  • Study of epidemic outbreaks caused by multidrug-resistant bacteria: carbapenemases and others
• The pharmacokinetics of antibiotics produced by multidrug-resistant bacteria and/or that are difficult to treat
  • The usefulness of determining the levels of colistin in patients with infections caused by multidrug-resistant Gram-negative bacilli
• Prosthetic infections in orthopaedic surgery and traumatology
  • The usefulness and application of sonication for infected joint replacements
  • Multicenter research on the epidemiology, clinical study and treatment of prosthetic infections from several microorganisms
• Sepsis and bacteraemia
• Influenza and other respiratory infections
• Tuberculosis in patients with HIV and in the general population
• Clinical trials with new antibiotics

2.- Research on HIV

• Gut microbiota and HIV
• Cardiovascular risk and HIV
• Osteoporosis and HIV
• Vitamin D and HIV
• Clinical trials with antiretroviral drugs