Genovefa Papanicolaou, MD

I am a physician with special expertise in the management of infections in patients with weakened immune systems. Patients undergoing chemotherapy or bone marrow transplantation are more vulnerable to infection than healthy individuals. These patients may develop infections that present with unusual severity. I monitor regularly all infections that develop in Memorial Hospital's Bone Marrow Transplant Unit to detect unusual trends and to assist in improving the outcome of infections. Even among our highly immunocompromised patients, there is significant variability in their susceptibility to infection.

My primary research interests focus on genetic differences of innate immune responses, which may help explain why some immunocompromised patients are more susceptible to infection than others. The long-term goal of our studies is to provide strategies to identify subsets of immunocompromised patients who are most vulnerable to infection.