This month we are publishing a recent piece from our newsletter 'Compass'. The piece is a contribution from Debbie Marriott, one of our Directors of Education and chair of the Anti-infective Committee. In the piece Debbie considers therapeutic drug monitoring of echinocandins and presents three clinical cases to highlight the main take-aways from a recently published review on the topic. Congratulations to the committee for an excellent review, and a big thanks for Debbie for the piece, which helps us consider the clinical application of the findings.

Deborah JE Marriott

Senior Staff Specialist, Infectious Diseases and Clinical Microbiology

St. Vincent's Hospital

Sydney, Australia

We have something really special this month: one of our members, Nicolas Picard, has recently transformed into a comic book character in order to tell us the history of Pharmacology. Nicolas is joined in his adventures by Vrob, an illustrator and former pharmacist, and together they travel the world, through space and time, as well as a myriad of pop culture references.

The title, Pharmacologix, reminds us of another much loved French comic book, that similarly involved the adventures of two friends. This project came into fruition during the pandemic, and Vrob notes that the project’s success may be due to people’s thirst for understanding science in an accessible way as we all move forward together in this particular moment in history. Really proud of you both, and looking forward to sequels and editions in other languages!

Nicolas Picard

Professor, University of Limoges

Clinical Practitioner, Limoges University Hospital

Limoges, France

This October we held the inaugural Asia-Pacific Regional Meeting on anti-infective TDM which included the enthusiastic participation of IATDMCT members Debbie Marriott, Danijela Kocic, Jane Carland, Sophie Stocker, Miao Yan, Jason Roberts, president Dario Cattaneo and president-elect Jan-Willem Alffenaar. We were joined by colleagues from the region, Lee Lee Low (Malaysia), Jayme Wong Sau Yeng and Tze-Peng Lim (Singapore). The meeting took place over two days, the first primarily focusing on laboratory aspects of TDM and the second on clinical implementation. It was really fantastic to hear a variety of local experiences!

Rome 2021 Congress Concludes Successfully

The Rome Congress was an absolute treat and we saw one of the biggest scientific programmes of any of our congresses. There was certainly a feeling of a scientific ‘Renaissance’ resulting from finally being able to come together!

This month we present a video blog of brief interviews with delegates in Rome. Watch out for President, Dario Cattaneo’s response to the question “Where was the first IATDMCT congress held?” (Actually, the answer is elusive, as it is the only congress not listed on the history of congresses page !) Enjoy!