House Wiki
House Wiki
Advertisement

Dr. David "Dave" Broda is the infectious disease specialist and the Head of Infection Control with the CDC in the episode A Pox on Our House. He is portrayed by actor Dylan Baker.

It sounds like Dr. Broda on the phone when House first phones the CDC to determine if smallpox could survive in an airtight container for 200 years. However, the team thinks House is crazy until Chris Taub finds pustules typical of smallpox on the patient and calls the CDC to report it.

Broda soon arrives with better isolation suits and orders House and his team off the case. However, by this time, House is now sure it isn't smallpox. Broda dismisses House's conclusions and says they probably missed a symptom earlier and that it probably presented before the pustules and not after. He orders genetic tests to confirm that will take about 18 hours to process.

House spends time trying to get Broda to do tests to confirm his hunches. He wants to convince Broda to do a CT scan of the patient's father, who is also showing symptoms, and suggests that Chase lie to set it up. Instead, Masters suggests telling him the truth to give Broda a unique opportunity to be the first person to do a scan of a smallpox infected brain. However, the father develops pustules and becomes too dangerous to move.

However, House becomes convinced that the father merely needs interferon and goes against Broda's orders and breaks quarantine. However, when the father gets worse and dies, House realizes that he will be exposed to the same disease when he switches out the oxygen bottle of his isolation suit. However, Masters comes up with an alternative diagnosis - rickettsialpox. House has to remove his gloves to look for the small black spots that are typical of the disease before the father's body is bleached to prevent the disease from spreading. He manages to find them just before Broda's assistants reach him.

Advertisement