Table of Contents
Credits
Host: Sara Dong
Guests: Karen Bloch, Carol Glaser, David Gaston, Arun Venkatesan
Content is based on the CID article featured in this episode although with additional writing by Sara Dong
Cover Art: Sara Dong
Audio Editing: Bentley Brown
Produced by Sara Dong with support from the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA)
Our Guests
Karen Bloch, MD, MPH
Dr. Karen Bloch is a Professor of Medicine and Associate Clinical Director of the Division of Infectious Diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Her clinical and research interests revolve around infections of the central nervous system. She is a coauthor on the IDSA Guidelines for the Management of Encephalitis and the International Encephalitis Consortium Consensus Statement.
Carol Glaser, MD
Dr. Carol Glaser is the Medical Officer for California Department of Public Health Center for Laboratory Sciences. Dr. Glaser first trained in veterinary medicine and then attended medical school followed by a pediatric residency and then a pediatric infectious disease fellowship. Her clinical and research interests focus on the diagnosis of encephalitis and other infectious related neurologic conditions such as acute flaccid myelitis as well as zoonotic infections.
David Gaston, MD, PhD
Dr. David Gaston is a clinical microbiologist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, TN. He is the medical director of molecular microbiology, and is also boarded in adult infectious diseases. His clinical and research interests focus on developing molecular techniques to advance infectious disease diagnostics.
Arun Venkatesan, MD, PhD
Dr. Arun Venkatesan is a Professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, in the Department of Neurology, where he serves as Director of the Johns Hopkins Encephalitis Center. His interests focus on developing biomarkers of infectious and autoimmune encephalitis, and studying mechanisms of central nervous system injury in the setting of infection and neuroinflammation.
Culture
Carol loves going on walks with her Australian shepherd dog
Karen enjoys a good cozy British mystery
David has loved building community with others in Nashville
Arun shared pickleball
Consult Notes
Welcome to this Febrile StAR episode!
These StAR episodes feature discussions with authors from State-of-the-Art Review articles from the Clinical Infectious Diseases journal (CID).
This episode is based on: Bloch KC, Glaser C, Gaston D, Venkatesan A. State of the Art: Acute Encephalitis. Clin Infect Dis. 2023;77(5):e14-e33. doi:10.1093/cid/ciad306
Journal companion article – Executive summary link: https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/77/5/669/7269079
Infographics
Goal
Listeners will be able to understand the evaluation, diagnosis, and management of acute encephalitis
Learning Objectives
After listening to this episode, listeners will be able to:
- Discuss the spectrum of common infectious etiologies of encephalitis, particularly herpes simplex 1 encephalitis
- Describe the core diagnostic evaluation for acute encephalitis
- Compare and contrast the epidemiologic risk factors for encephalitis in various US regions
- Recognize autoimmune encephalitis as a heterogeneous syndrome which can encompass multiple categories such as autoantibody-mediated encephalitis (example, anti-NMDAR)
Disclosures
Febrile podcast reports no relevant financial disclosures
Potential conflicts of interest are noted in the CID article as well as reproduced below:
Karen Bloch, Arun Venkatesan, and Carol Glaser had a role as a Medical Advisor of Encephalitis 411 (unpaid).
Karen Bloch and Arun Venkatesan report unpaid participation on a Data Safety and Monitoring Board for the French Dex Enceph Study.
Arun Venkatesan received payment for expert testimony as an expert witness for the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program and an expert witness for medicolegal cases; travel support partly paid directly to the author for the UK Encephalitis Society Annual Meeting; and an unpaid role as a scientific advisory panel member, UK Encephalitis Society.
David Gaston received research reagents from Illumina, Inc, and IDbyDNA, Inc; serves on the Scientific Advisory Board for bioMerieux; reports grants or contracts from the Fisher Center Discovery Program, Johns Hopkins; and payment or honoraria for lectures, presentations, speaker’s bureaus, manuscript writing, or educational events from the American Association of Clinical Chemistry and Pan American Society of Clinical Virology.
Citation
Bloch, K., Venkatesan, A., Gaston, D., Glaser, C., Dong, S. “#101: StAR: Acute encephalitis”. Febrile: A Cultured Podcast. https://player.captivate.fm/episode/41c69a9a-51b4-4354-99b7-0d6e12df80f0