Meet The Microbiologist - The Scientists Behind The Microbiology

Dr. Ellen Jo Baron is a professor of pathology and director of clinical microbiology at Stanford University’s medical center in Palo Alto, California.  A co-author of the authoritative Manual of Clinical Microbiology, Dr. Baron and her staff in the clinical lab evaluate and advise in the development of new diagnostic technologies.  Dr. Baron has also volunteered her time as a microbiology advisor in numerous hospitals and clinics in developing countries since 1996. In a hospital, you have to be able to diagnose infections in order to treat patients, but hospitals in the developing world that are forced to get along with inadequate and ill-equipped microbiology labs have to treat infectious disease blindly, without full knowledge of which organism is to blame and which drugs will be most effective.  These missteps cost lives.  Dr. Baron, who normally works in a modern, fully-equipped western hospital, travels to hospitals and clinics in places like Cambodia and Nepal to train staff and organize cl