Infectious diseases

Our infectious diseases services based at Charing Cross, Hammersmith, St Charles and St Mary’s hospitals have outstanding expertise in treating and managing infections and fever including tuberculosis (TB).

Our infectious disease clinics have particular expertise in the treatment of tuberculosis and we diagnose and treat around 300 cases of tuberculosis each year. Our tuberculosis service is run jointly by the infectious diseases and respiratory medicine departments.

Sub specialties

• OPAT service (outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy)

Conditions and treatments

We have a purpose-built infectious disease inpatient facility at Hammersmith Hospital for patients with severe infections and fever requiring isolation or high-level medical treatment and monitoring. The range of patients seen in our infectious disease clinics are treated for a variety of infections, including:

• Tuberculosis
• Latent tuberculosis in TB contacts and patients undergoing immunosuppressive therapies
• Atypical mycobacterial infection
• Fever, diarrhoea and other conditions in returning travellers
• Fever of unknown origin
• Bone and joint infection
• Cellulitis
• Pyelonephritis
• Endocarditis
• Persistent chest infections
• Recurrent urinary infections
• Exposure to animal or tick bites
• Other infections

We also offer an outpatient parenteral antibiotic therapy (OPAT) service that offers at-home intravenous antibiotics to qualifying patients.

Additional information

Elective placements

Yes, these are available to students in the final year of studies via:
Email: imperial.Electives@nhs.net
Email: Dr Eimear Brannigan – eimear.brannigan@nhs.net

Observerships are available for medically qualified persons interested in short term attachments in clinical infection via: 

Email: imperial.Medical.Education@nhs.net and
Email: Dr Eimear Brannigan – eimear.brannigan@nhs.net

Further online resources

• TB alert
• NHS Choices – tuberculosis
• NHS Choices – hepatitis