Dr Rebecca Drummond, a Birmingham Fellow who recently established a research group at the University of Birmingham, has won an award from the British Infection Association to study the links between antibiotic treatment and fungal diseases.
Antibiotics are a life-saving drug used to treat infections caused by bacteria. However, some patients treated with these drugs will go on to develop fungal infections. The reason why this happens isn’t well understood.
Recent evidence has suggested that antibiotics may affect more than just our gut bacteria and cause disturbances in our immune system. Dr Drummond will use her award to investigate whether this is the case in patients with fungal infections.
Dr Drummond explains: “Invasive fungal infections are a major clinical challenge because we don’t have many antifungal drugs and there are no vaccines to protect us against fungi.
"It is therefore important to understand what factors might increase the likelihood of developing these infections and why, so that we can better care for vulnerable patients. I’m looking forward to beginning this exciting work here at the University of Birmingham.”