Procalcitonin:
Antibiotic Stewardship in Respiratory Tract Infection (The ProHOSP Study)

Thursday, December 3, 4:00pm – 5:00pm EST, Webinar

Shortening the duration of antibiotic therapy is associated with reduced antibiotic exposure and reduced treatment costs. As a marker of sepsis severity, Procalcitonin (PCT) can provide useful information to help guide clinical decisions regarding antibiotic therapy. In this webinar, the lead author of the 2009 ProHOSP randomized, controlled trial published in JAMA (2009 Vol 302, No. 10:1059-1066) will discuss the trial’s results on the use of PCT guidance in reducing antibiotic exposure in patients with LRTI compared with treatment based on standard guidelines.
Objectives:
After this presentation, attendees will be able to:
Understand the application of PCT in identifying patients with lower respiratory tract infections and sepsis
Understand the application of PCT as a marker for antibiotic guidance
Understand the findings of the recent ProHOSP study published in JAMA
Speaker:

Philipp Schuetz, MD
Attending Physician, Internal Medicine,
University Hospital, Basel, Switzerland

Dr. Philipp Schuetz was born in Switzerland and studied Medicine at the University of Basel, Switzerland, and the University Kremlin Bicetre in Paris, France. He worked as an Internist and Endocrinologist in the University Hospital of Basel. He has done extensive research on hormones, “hormokines” and other biomarkers for better diagnostic and prognostic work up of patients with systemic infections. He managed two large nation-wide trials investigating Procalcitonin-guided antibiotic stewardship in primary care and in the Emergency Departments of several Swiss hospitals. He authored and co-authored more than 30 original articles and reviews and published his original work in journals including the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) and Archives of Internal Medicine, among others. He recently moved to Boston to obtain a Master of Public Health at the Harvard School of Public Health and to continue his scientific work at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC).