Infectious Diseases

This specialty residency is a 12-month postgraduate program offered jointly by the USC School of Pharmacy and an affiliated clinical site, Huntington Hospital in Pasadena. This program centers on developing the competencies necessary to provide pharmaceutical care to patients with infectious diseases by providing balanced training in patient care, teaching, and clinical research in the area of infectious diseases pharmacotherapy.

Clinical Practice

The resident provides clinical services with a focus on anti-infective therapy through participation in medical system committees, antimicrobial stewardship program and patient care rounds on the:

  • Infectious Disease Consult Service
  • Critical Care Service
  • Outpatient HIV/AIDS Clinic

Huntington Hospital serves as the primary training site for the resident. The hospital is a 525-bed community teaching hospital affiliated with the USC School of Pharmacy and the Keck School of Medicine.

Clinical services include drug therapy monitoring and consultation to pharmacy and medical staff with an emphasis on anti-infective therapy. In addition, the resident participates in the antimicrobial stewardship program as a core member to ensure optimal use of antimicrobial therapy within the institution. Antibiogram trends will be tracked, antimicrobial prescribing patterns will evaluated and feedback to prescribers as well as ongoing education on antimicrobial use will be provided to pharmacy, medical and other healthcare providers. The resident partakes in formulary management through the development and implementation of policies and procedures related to antimicrobial utilization as part of the effort for continuous quality improvement in anti-infective use.

Teaching

The resident is actively involved in:

  • Leading conference sessions
  • Providing didactic lectures
  • Developing infectious disease case studies with preceptor supervision
  • Serving as a role model for the students and pharmacy practice residents during their clinical clerkships in Infectious Diseases
  • Presenting regular staff development lectures to pharmacy and medical staff at the clinical site on related topics

Education

The resident receives training via coursework and seminars in the following areas:

  • Microbiology laboratory techniques
  • Analytical methods
  • Biostatistics/research methodology in preparation for participation in clinical investigations

The resident also attends one national infectious disease conference.

Research

The resident actively participates in all aspects of an infectious disease clinical investigation which include:

  • Research study design
  • IRB submission, data collection
  • Data analysis
  • Submission of manuscript for publication
  • Presentation of findings at a national meeting of a professional organization

Contact Us

If you have questions or need additional information, please contact:

Annie Wong-Beringer, PharmD, FCCP, FIDSA
Program Preceptor, Pharmacy Practice Residency-Infectious Diseases
University of Southern California
School of Pharmacy
1985 Zonal Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90089-9121
Telephone: (323) 442-1356
FAX: (626) 628-3024
Email: anniew@usc.edu

William C. Gong, PharmD, FASHP, FCSHP
Director, Residency and Fellowship Training
Associate Professor of Clinical Pharmacy
University of Southern California
School of Pharmacy
1985 Zonal Avenue
Los Angeles, California 90089-9121
Telephone: (323) 442-2625
Email: wgong@usc.edu, Res-Fellow@pharmacy.usc.edu