Ann Petru, MD
Director, Infectious Diseases
Director, Pediatric HIV/AIDS Program
Ann Petru, MD has a long history of treating children with infectious diseases at Children’s Hospital Oakland. She is also a longtime clinical scientist at Children’s Hospital Oakland Research Institute, Children’s research arm. Dr. Petru can discuss many topics related to pediatric infectious diseases including antibiotics, “Staph” and “Strep” infections, bacterial meningitis, Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), Entero virus, Ebola virus, and other viral diseases. However, her primary focus is treatment of children with HIV/AIDS and preventing transmission of HIV from mothers to their babies.
Dr. Petru provided care for the first pediatric HIV/AIDS case in the Bay Area in 1983. In 1986, she started the Pediatric HIV/AIDS Program, which has treated more than 700 HIV-infected and HIV-exposed infants, children and adolescents. Many of her patients were among the first to participate in AZT treatment and other clinical trials. These groundbreaking studies allowed her and her staff to evaluate many drug combinations for HIV management, new immunizations for children with HIV, and the long-term effects on children receiving drugs for HIV disease. Because drug therapies have been so successful, children are living much longer. Improved maternal drug therapies reducing transmission of HIV from mothers to their children, means there are now fewer infants born to HIV-infected mothers.
