Hooked on ID with Robert A. Bonomo, MD
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I really enjoyed my residency training at University Hospitals of Cleveland and at the Cleveland VA. Because of some personal issues, I decided that I wanted to join the Public Health Service and work in underserved areas.
After I graduated from my residency training, I took a position in primary care, internal medicine. I worked at the Cleveland Neighborhood Health Services in the 1980s, when young men began coming into the clinic with HIV/AIDS. This impacted me so much that I was compelled to return to training in infectious diseases at University Hospitals and the VA. I spent a lot of my early fellowship years in that area.
The biggest clinical problem that I dealt with in primary care was drug-resistant gonorrhea, which has not gone away. My division chief suggested I go to the VA to Dr. David Shlaes’ lab to learn about molecular biology, which started my interest in antimicrobial resistance.
ID was the one specialty where I could take care of the patient and understand what was happening on a molecular level. It checked all the boxes for me. It was applying science to the benefit of patients. That's what got me hooked on ID. It was the comprehensive nature of the specialty, and the ability to respond to societal needs and problems.
ID is always the first to take care of the disenfranchised populations, the poor and needy. We're always on the front lines during a pandemic. Our specialty pays it forward.
Robert A. Bonomo, MD
Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine
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