Course overview
This course is designed to provide students with an understanding of the pathogenesis of clinically relevant infectious diseases, the principles which enable diagnosis of infectious diseases and the procedures which facilitate laboratory diagnosis of infectious diseases. Host-parasite relationships: normal flora. Systematic study of bacteria of medical importance, their principle diagnostic characteristics and techniques for the identification of clinically relevant organisms. Pathogenesis and epidemiology of important human bacterial infectious diseases. Routes of transmission of infectious diseases. Microbial pathogenesis and virulence factors. Control of infectious diseases: therapeutic use of antimicrobials and immunisation. Laboratory procedures with antimicrobials.
Course learning outcomes
- Describe the principle characteristics of bacteria of medical importance, both pathogens and commensal organisms, and the relevance of these characteristics to diagnostic techniques.
- Apply in a laboratory setting the principles involved in the laboratory diagnosis and investigation of infectious human diseases
- Describe the principles involved in the control of infectious diseases with antimicrobials and describe and apply techniques relating to antimicrobials in the laboratory.
- Describe how micro-organisms interact with their hosts, their principle virulence factors and how knowledge of these factors can apply to the diagnosis and prevention of infectious diseases.