Professor Fidelma Fitzpatrick is the Head of Department of Clinical Microbiology; RCSI; Consultant Microbiologist at Beaumont Hospital, Dublin; and Co-Director of Year 2, Undergraduate Medicine at the RCSI. Fidelma has chaired the HSE National Sepsis Steering Group since the establishment of the national sepsis programme. In addition Fidelma is in her second term as elected chair of the European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (ESCMID) Study Group for Clostridioides difficile; the RCSI representative on the board of the Dublin Dental Hospital; a member of the Community antimicrobial prescribing committee; HSE Antimicrobial Resistance Infection Control (AMRIC); and a National Healthcare-associated infection (HAI) hospital point prevalence steering group; Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC).
Previously Prof. Fitzpatrick worked at a national level from 2010-2014. As the first National clinical lead for the prevention of HAI and antimicrobial resistance (AMR), she established the national clinical programme, lead the national public information campaign on antibiotics, national hand hygiene and antimicrobial stewardship campaigns and oversaw the establishment of the National AMR Intersectoral Coordinating Committee between the Dept of Health and Dept of Agriculture. As consultant microbiologist in the HPSC she established C. difficile surveillance in Ireland, chaired a number of national guideline committees, was the European Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (ECDC) national HAI focal point and coordinated the first national HAI prevalence studies in both hospitals and long-term care facilities.