Michael S. Saag MD

Dr. Saag received a B.S. in chemistry with honors from Tulane University, earned his medical degree with honors from the University of Louisville, and completed his residency and infectious disease and molecular virology fellowship training at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Dr. Saag has participated in many studies of antiretroviral therapy as well as novel treatments for opportunistic infections. He has published over 400 articles in peer reviewed journals, including the first description of the use of viral load in clinical practice, the first description of the rapid dynamics of viral replication, the first guidelines for use of viral load in practice, and directed the ‘first-in- patient’ studies of 7 of the 30 antiretroviral drugs currently on the market.

Dr. Saag Co-Edited a textbook entitled AIDS Therapy (now in its 3rd edition) and currently serves as an Editor of the Sanford Guide for Antimicrobial Agents and the Sanford HIV Guide. Dr. Saag is Chair of the IAS-USA Antiretroviral Therapy Guidelines panel and was a founding Co-Chair of the AASLD / IDSA Hepatitis C Guidelines Panel. He was the 2014 Castle-Connolly National Physician of the Year and was inducted into the Alabama Healthcare Hall of Fame. Dr. Saag published a memoir entitled “Positive: One doctor’s encounters with death, life, and the US Healthcare system,” now in its second printing.