Manuela Ceccarelli

Dr. Ceccarelli has graduated in Medicine and Surgery at the Catholic University of Sacred Heart in 2012, presenting a dissertation on low levels of vitamin D in migrant children. During the first years of her education she carried out her research on pediatric infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis and mother-to-child transmitted infections, and pediatric migration, at the Etnopediatric Outpatient Clinic of the Fondazione Policlinico Universitario “A. Gemelli”, in Rome.

She completed her specialty in Infectious and Tropical Diseases at the University of Messina in 2019. During her residency she spent a year abroad in Philadelphia, PA, USA, at the University of Pennsylvania, where she could deepen her knowledge about molecular biology applied to HIV reservoirs. She presented a dissertation with the title “Effects of Long-Term Combined Antiretroviral Therapy on Integrated HIV-DNA in Acutely Treated vs Chronically Infected Patients: An Analysis of Decay and Characteristics of the Reservoir with New Generation Sequencing”. She presented the results of this study at the 17^th European AIDS Conference, in Basel, Switzerland, in 2019.

From 2020 to 2022 she was a Post-Doc at the Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine of the University of Catania, following a research project titled “Use of Antimicrobials in Hospital”. During this period she could deepen her interest and knowledge about antibiotic resistance and hospital-acquired infections, also attending the Molecular and Medical Microbiology and Antibiotic Resistance Laboratory (MMAR) of the University.

She was awarded with the National Scientific Qualification as Associate Professor in 2021.

She is currently attending the PhD program in “Translational Molecular Medicine and Surgery” XXXVI cycle at the University of Messina.

Since May 2022 she works at the Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine of the University of Catania as a Senior Researcher.

She worked as an attending physician at:

• Unit of Internal Medicine, “Nuova Santa Teresa” private clinic, in Viterbo, from 2013 to 2015
• Unit of Infectious Diseases, “G. Martino” University Hospital, Messina, from 2015 to 2019
• Unit of Infectious Diseases, ARNAS “Garibaldi”, “Nesima” Hospital, Catania, in 2020, during the COVID-19 Emergency.