Summary of a workshop on infections in patients with cystic fibrosis.

Cystic fibrosis is currently the most common fatal hereditary disease of the 
Caucasian race. The lack of effective oral antibiotics against Pseudomonas aeruginosa 
precludes either systemic treatment or suppression, in an outpatient setting, of 
the chronic pseudomonas bronchitis typically seen in CF patients. Because of 
the central role of infection, and particularly pseudomonas infection, in the 
sequence of events that leads to respiratory failure and death in 
CF, currently available information regarding the pathogenesis of infections caused by 
P. aeruginosa was emphasized and discussed at a workshop on infections 
in patients with CF, sponsored by the National Institute of Allergy 
and Infectious Diseases in Bethesda, Md., on January 9 and 10, 
1979. 