Issuu

B E T H I S R A E L D E AC O N E S S M E D I C A L C E N T E R

WINTER 2017–18

Turning Data into Wisdom p. 6

Breaking the Silence p. 8

BEATING HEART DISEASE ROBERT E. GERSZTEN, M.D.

Thinking Inside the Box p. 12

Blazing a New Trail p. 14

During a typical stint in the cardiac intensive care unit, Robert E. Gerszten, M.D., will often evaluate patients experiencing their first heart attack. Many are easy to identify based on traditional risk factors of age, gender, hypertension, high cholesterol levels, or smoking history. But those aren’t the patients that keep the chief of the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine up at night. “The problem is that if you look at the entire segment of people who develop heart disease, lots of them don’t have those risk factors,” he says of the individuals who do not show the traditional warning signs to trigger immediate life saving care. “We need to uncover better risk factors, and we need to understand the biology much better.” Gerszten, who took the helm of the division two years ago, is a national leader in translational research to

identify new biomarkers and pathways for more accurately predicting and diagnosing heart disease in all patients and for understanding who will respond to therapies. He has focused most of his work on the relationship between cardiac and metabolic diseases, such as heart disease and diabetes, a field known as cardiometabolic disease. “I started off as a basic scientist working in a lab that was completely divorced from the clinical world,” he recalls. “The work certainly had clinical implications, but now we are really at a time where implementation is not way off in the future. We are talking about it daily.” The “it” they are talking about is not only diagnosing heart disease decades before patients feel the effects, but treating it as well.

CONTINUED ON P. 2

BEATING HEART DISEASE ROBERT E. GERSZTEN, M.D. CONTINUED FROM P. 1

Now as chief of a division rich in clinical innovation, Gerszten’s goal is to integrate the outstanding, crossdisciplinary research into the clinical arm and secure BIDMC’s place as a premier academic medical center for cardiology in the United States. BIDMC is certainly set up for the task. The Division of Cardiovascular Medicine operates one of the highest volume cardiac catheterization programs in New England, and its Structural Heart Center is using innovative surgical and interventional techniques to provide patients with the most advanced therapies. “It’s always nice to be in a division that has that legacy of innovation, but that legacy should motivate you to innovate even more,” Gerszten says, noting that with technological advances in the field and an influx of talented new staff to complement his stalwart team, they are poised to do just that. In the last few years, the unique combination of advanced blood screening technologies and more readily available health information databases have provided researchers with the necessary tools to make some headway and bring better diagnostics and more personalized 2

treatments directly to patients. Not only is his team equipped with two of the most sophisticated blood analyzer machines on the market today, but Gerszten also has access to extensive health and clinical trial databases and skilled statisticians through the Richard A. and Susan F. Smith Center for Outcomes Research in Cardiology. “We need to convert big data into information to help us to take care of patients in the future.” Recognizing the value of shared information, Gerszten insists that all of his results are publically available for other researchers and clinicians to use. He is following the lead of the landmark Framingham Heart Study— the first study to identify the common characteristics that contribute to cardiovascular disease by tracking the health of a huge cohort of participants spanning three generations for almost 70 years. The famed project still shares its results with the research community today, and Gerszten and others are applying new approaches to the study’s existing blood samples and patient health information to glean knowledge that may help them pinpoint new, more specific risk factors.

Now, using emerging proteomic technology, which analyzes more than 1,100 proteins in a single blood sample, Gerszten and his team are getting an even closer look at the telltale molecular signs of cardiac disease. In a recently published study, BIDMC researchers used this approach to identify nearly 200 new proteins in the blood that increase within one hour following myocardial injury, or heart attack. These new biomarkers could be an early diagnostic for heart disease, and clinicians are beginning to validate this discovery at BIDMC. “If you come into the emergency department and have an equivocal EKG, we hope to leverage those markers to make a very early diagnosis—as soon as 10 minutes after myocardial injury—and know that you are having a heart attack,” he says of the treatment-altering blood test. This discovery is critical to guide faster care for traditionally low-risk patients who are not showing obvious signs of a heart attack and may eventually lead to more predictive diagnoses well before injury occurs. Gerszten is also using this sophisticated technology to understand how physical activity improves and maintains health. Supported by an Giving Matters | Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

$11 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Gerszten and his team are investigating the molecular changes that occur in our bodies during and after exercise and have teamed up with seven other cardiovascular centers across the country to start collecting pilot data. “We know exercise confers these beneficial effects, but how it does so is not entirely clear,” says Gerszten, who is leading the biochemical profiling of all samples across the study. “This is going to be the largest exercise trial ever.” At each location, researchers will be evaluating the molecular response of healthy patients engaged in endurance, bicycle, or weight-resistance training. At BIDMC, clinicians are going to use the same approach to assess patients with heart failure and diabetes. The first step is to determine if the molecular changes in the body during physical activity can predict who

may benefit from which type of exercise depending on age, gender, body type, and fitness level. The ultimate goal is to tailor a highly precise exercise program to each individual. “It is early on, but we are already starting to get hints of who responds to which particular type of training,” Gerszten says. Eventually, researchers hope to use the biochemical snapshot of what happens in your blood during exercise to determine important pathways with the aim of identifying drugs that will produce the same beneficial response. While the support from the NIH is essential for a study of this magnitude, Gerszten understands that, with the threat of significant cuts to federal funding, individual philanthropy is crucial to his success in executing outside-the-box projects. “The NIH often likes to fund things that have already been done,” he says. “A lot of the research we do is

“ It’s always nice to be in a division that has that legacy of innovation, but that legacy should motivate you to innovate even more.” —Robert Gerszten, M.D.

admittedly a little risky.” Despite this concern, in the last two years, the NIH has increased its funding to the BIDMC Division of Cardiovascular Medicine, which also boasted three American Heart Association Young Investigator Award finalists for the first time. “Our work consists of high-risk, high-reward projects that few people are doing,” Gerszten says. “That is usually where the big results happen. I really think that’s where philanthropy must figure prominently.”

Gerszten has only just begun to put his own mark on the division, but his collaborative and transformative approach is already changing the face of cardiac health. “I wake up every day, and my wife says, I can’t believe you love your job so much,” he laughs. “It is impossible to explain. It gives me enormous gratification. I like to be on a winning team, and this is a winning team. This team was always a good team, but I think now we are becoming the Pats.” 

To Learn by Heart Generous $500K Gift Creates Scholars Program in Cardiovascular Outcomes Research

hen Stephanie “Stevie” Spina first started experiencing atrial fibrillation, or abnormal heart rhythm, her BIDMC primary care physician immediately referred her to Peter Zimetbaum, M.D., associate chief of cardiology and a renowned expert on the disorder. Through the trial and error of various therapeutic options available to treat her condition, she quickly learned that there is not a one-size-fits-all approach to care. “There are so many different medications out there, and they work for some people and not for others,” she says. Stevie and her husband, David, were familiar with the idea of outcomes research, which analyzes how treatments impact various patient populations to better inform care, and were intrigued by the leading-edge work of the Richard A. and Susan F. Smith Center for Outcomes Research in

Giving Matters | www.bidmc.org/giving

Cardiology. “BIDMC is extremely accommodating to my needs, and I think that’s what the Smith Center is all about,” Stevie says. “Outcomes research in cardiology acknowledges that you don’t treat everyone as one entity or in the same way with medications or procedures.” In recognition of Zimetbaum’s outstanding care and the center’s innovative efforts, Stevie and David contributed $500,000 to establish the Spina Scholars in Cardiovascular Outcomes Research. The Spina Scholar awards provide crucial funding for junior faculty to explore groundbreaking ideas in this emerging field. “The Spinas’ generous gift has allowed me to conduct important work, and the Smith Center has offered the support to perform robust analyses,” says Wilson Grandin, M.D., M.P.H., M.Ed., a cardiologist in the Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Cardiology

Stevie and David Spina

Program and the first recipient of the Spina Scholar award. Grandin, alongside Smith Center statistician Kevin Kennedy, is using outcomes data from a national registry of left ventricular assist device (LVAD) patients to better understand the complications of this type of mechanical circulatory support including right heart failure. The registry has collected data from more than 20,000 patients across the country since 2006. Their work has implications for improving patient selection for LVAD therapy, as well as optimizing medical therapy to

stabilize right heart function. “When you are doing research with patient-level data, looking at outcomes and the effects of devices and new drugs, I believe there is a premium on having people who conduct that research also having a role in clinical care,” Grandin says. “As an active advanced heart failure clinician, I am able to better translate the findings of our research into relevant clinical practice.” 

LETTER FROM THE CHIEF DEVELOPMENT OFFICER

Dear Reader,

Giving Matters is published by the Office of Development at BIDMC. Kristine Laping Chief Development Officer (617) 667-7334 klaping@bidmc.harvard.edu Kate Gorman Senior Executive Director of External Relations (617) 667-7371 kjgorman@bidmc.harvard.edu Alexandra Molloy Senior Director of Leadership Communications (617) 667-7350 amolloy@bidmc.harvard.edu Managing Editor: Alexandra Molloy Editor: Allison Knee Writing: Allison Knee, Alexandra Molloy, Kathryn Berger, Lauren Carr Event and Marketing Coverage: Allison Knee, Alexandra Molloy Photography: BIDMC Media Services, Lucien Capehart Photography, Danielle Duffey, Joel Haskell, Theresa Johnson Herlihy Other photography courtesy of the Hood Family, the Smith Family, and the Spina Family Design: kor group, Boston

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center is a place where we continually strive for excellence. As a Harvard-affiliated academic medical center, we not only provide superior clinical care, but, through our phenomenal teaching and research efforts, we also help define the future of medicine. Helping sustain this quest for excellence is the mission of the Office of Development, and I am so proud to report that in fiscal year 2017 we had a record-breaking fundraising year for the sixth time in a row, raising more than $80 million. This issue of Giving Matters explores some of our most prominent areas of excellence in clinical care, teaching, and research supported by this type of generous philanthropy. In this issue, we feature our chief of the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine (cover story), as well as a new educational program in cardiology outcomes research (page 3). We spotlight our new International Healthcare Innovation Professorship at Harvard Medical School (page 6) and our new chair in hematology and oncology (page 14)—our first BIDMC endowed chair ever. We also highlight our pioneering research in HIV and Zika (page 7) and infant health and nutrition (page 11). While we take great pride in celebrating all these extraordinary initiatives and accomplishments, we remain humble and grateful. With your tremendous support and dedication, we continue to work toward excellence each day. Thank you for being a part of the BIDMC family and helping us provide world-class care. Sincerely,

BITS & PIECES Little updates on big happenings in the BIDMC community. Want to learn more or share one of your own? Email development@bidmc.harvard.edu.

Kristine C. Laping

When asked to help in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma,  a Beth Israel Deaconess emergency response team answered with compassion. Eight nurses and an emergency manager provided vital medical assistance to people in Florida who had been displaced from their homes. The team worked alongside the National Guard. September 17 marked the 10 annual A Reason to  Ride event to benefit cancer care and research th

at BIDMC. This year, the event attracted more than 300 participants and raised more than $70,000. Participants had the option of completing a 10-, 25-, or 50-mile bike ride or a 5K walk. Event highlights included a Fuddruckers cookout, raffles, silent auction, music, and much more. On September 23, more than 1,200 former patients  and family members celebrated the 25 anniversary th

of the Klarman Family Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). Co-chairs Kate Lubin and Glen Sutton, BIDMC President Pete Healy, and Chief of Neonatology DeWayne Pursley, M.D., M.P.H., gave remarks, and NICU graduates enjoyed mini golf, batting cages, zip lining, bumper cars, games, and face painting. This winter, Ashley Bernon hosted two events in support  of her participation in the Boston Marathon to benefit

Mike Werbick’s lucky day came  when he found a kidney donor— his wife, April. After recovering from transplant surgery at BIDMC, he opened Lucky Day Thrift Shop, where a portion of proceeds benefit the BIDMC Social Work Transplant Fund. On November 17, BIDMC celebrated World Pancreatic  Cancer Day, featuring Manuel Hidalgo, M.D., Ph.D., A. James Moser, M.D., and Pier Paolo Pandolfi, M.D., Ph.D. During the event, Cathy Griffith presented Moser with $30,000 on behalf of the Greg and Cathy Griffith Family Foundation, which has given more than $200,000 to date. The nonprofit organization Wake Up Narcolepsy made a  generous gift of $30,000 to support the research of Tom Scammell, M.D., who is investigating brain pathways to create improved therapies for narcolepsy. Christopher S. Ogilvy, M.D., director of the Brain  Aneurysm Institute at BIDMC, was awarded the 2017 Brain Aneurysm Foundation Physician Champion Award in recognition of his lifelong dedication to raising awareness of brain aneurysms, developing interventions, and helping survivors recover.

BIDMC’s Labor and Delivery team, sponsored by Burberry and InStyle magazine. 4

Giving Matters | Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

LEADERSHIP SPOTLIGHT

Sam Kennedy: For Love of the Game “There is no feeling equal to that of meeting a person whose life you’ve helped change in a positive way.” Sam Kennedy grew up less than two miles from Fenway Park. He walked to the ballpark with his father and attended games for $2 using his father’s clergy pass. He would stand behind Grandstand Section 19 and marvel at legends like Wade Boggs, his favorite player growing up. “I fell in love with the game this way,” says Kennedy, president and CEO of the Boston Red Sox and member of the BIDMC Trustee Advisory Board. “I didn’t have any special treatment—all I had was access. It’s a privilege to now be president of the club that I grew up admiring, and to also be in a position to help provide access to the next generation of Red Sox fans.” BIDMC has been the Official Hospital of the Boston Red Sox since 2002—a mutually beneficial partnership that began during a time of leadership transition for both organizations. “It’s been a great rebound for BIDMC and the Red Sox in the last decade and a half,” Kennedy says, noting the team’s three World Series Championships after an 86-year drought and BIDMC’s striking growth and affiliate expansion under the leadership of CEO Kevin Tabb, M.D. After working closely with the medical center over the past 15 years, Kennedy joined the Trustee Advisory Board last fall. “BID has helped us take care of folks, especially on the rare occasion when we have a serious fan safety issue,” Kennedy says. “To be so geographically close can be the difference in recovery and maybe even saving someone’s life. I have an interest in seeing the hospital continue to be as successful as possible, and if I can personally contribute to that in any way, I am happy to.” As a member of the hospital’s lay leadership team, Kennedy is lending his expertise to BIDMC’s Marketing Committee. “I hope I can offer an outside perspective and counsel on issues related to the business side of the organization,” he says. “I’m not a doctor

Giving Matters | www.bidmc.org/giving

or medical expert, but as someone with experience running a successful organization and taking care of the people who come through our gates each and every night, I hope I can provide opinions on ways to improve the operation and experience of the patients who visit the hospital.” After working briefly for the San Diego Padres with former Red Sox President Larry Lucchino and childhood friend Theo Epstein, Kennedy joined the Red Sox in 2002 under the new ownership group. He was intimately involved in the transformation of Fenway Park and the Fenway Park experience as he worked his way from vice president of corporate partnerships to chief operating officer before being named president of the club in 2015 and CEO this summer. “We have three things we focus on every day,” he says. “One is winning baseball games. That is first and foremost. The second is the experience at Fenway and trying to make sure that every person who comes through the gates has a great experience. And third is being active in the community and working with our foundation and charitable efforts.” The Red Sox team up with BIDMC to accomplish all three goals. In addition to providing medical expertise and care for players so they can win games on the field, BIDMC staff treat thousands of patrons each year at Fenway Park’s first aid stations to ensure a safe and fun experience for all. Also, the medical center and the Red Sox collaborate to sponsor landmark community programs including the Red Sox Scholars and the 9/11 Blood Drive with the American Red Cross. “I think ultimately, the philanthropic commitment is part of our DNA,” Kennedy says. “I know for me, as well as our owners, there is no feeling equal to that of meeting a person whose life you’ve helped change in a positive way.” 

“We want physicians around the world to have data about their patients...to make the best decisions about their care.” — Ben Zhou, M.D.

Ben Zhou, M.D., and John Halamka, M.D.

TURNING DATA INTO WISDOM Major Gift Establishes New Harvard Medical School Professorship Focused on IT Innovation

en Zhou, M.D., recalls attending health care information technology (IT) forums around the world. Over two decades, he was always captivated by the same keynote speaker: John Halamka, M.D., M.S., chief information officer of the Beth Israel Deaconess System. For years, Zhou and Halamka continually crossed paths at various conferences; they eventually collaborated, and ultimately, they became close friends and travel companions. To date, Zhou and Halamka have worked to improve health care IT systems in nearly every region of China. Zhou’s immense gratitude for their partnership led him to facilitate a transformational gift of $3.3 million to BIDMC to establish an endowed professorship in honor of Halamka. This remarkable gift, from prestigious private equity and consulting firm HAVY International, which specializes in health care and civil engineering, created the International Healthcare Innovation Professorship at Harvard Medical School. His new role will allow Halamka to travel to any country and help implement technology to enhance the quality and safety of its care. “This incredible 6

gift will empower BIDMC and HAVY to make a tremendous impact on patients and societies across the globe,” says Halamka. The greatest development in the IT field over the past decade has been the effort to analyze big data. In medicine, this data includes patient demographics, medical history, diagnostic results, and treatment information. “When we talk about evidence-based medicine in IT, our goal is turning all this data into wisdom,” says Zhou, who serves as a trusted advisor for the Chinese Ministries of Health and Technology. In China, patients have the choice of receiving traditional Eastern care or Western diagnostics and treatments. Halamka and Zhou’s aim is not to change that; rather, they seek to use technology to streamline care. “We want physicians around the world to have data about their patients at their fingertips so they are equipped to make the best possible decisions about their care,” says Zhou. The professorship will establish a two-way, or bi-directional, exchange of information. “All countries can and should learn from each other,” says Halamka, citing the U.S.’s lack

of a national identifier to coordinate care and distinguish among patients with the same name. The cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and others in China solved this issue by providing each of their multi-million inhabitants with a medical identity card—which Halamka notes is a key lesson for the U.S. In China, Zhou and Halamka are working to promote innovation through integrated networks and mobile health technologies. They hope to use these approaches to unify electronic health record (EHR) software in China, which is currently different in every hospital. Having developed the first hospital EHR in 1985, BIDMC is well poised to help. Zhou was immersed in medicine at an early age—his mother is a cardiologist and his father, a surgeon. In 1972 Zhou’s father, Dr. Chou Kuan-han, a general surgeon and a leading acupuncturist, was part of the first official U.S. medical delegation from China. In addition to visiting the president in the White House, Kuan-han had a life-changing exchange with Harvard and Beth Israel Hospital leaders and faculty members. Kuan-han then

decided to focus on cardiovascular and thoracic surgery—influenced by Paul White, M.D., and E. Grey Dimond, M.D.—and went on to perform Peking University’s first open heart and thoracic operation. “I deeply admire my father, who helped countless patients,” says Zhou. Having always been passionate about technology, Zhou focused his career on bringing innovation to health care. After earning degrees in computer science and medicine, he held a number of management, consulting, and executive roles in academia and industry. Today, he is president of HAVY, which is a primary partner of Harvard Medical School in its global programs in China. By playing a key role in this incredible gift to BIDMC, Zhou is following in his father’s footsteps to influence significant change in medicine. “John’s teachings will have a ripple effect,” says Zhou. “All these people who learn from him will continue to teach others.” Adds Halamka: “With this extraordinary gift, HAVY and Ben will profoundly improve patient outcomes around the world.” 

Giving Matters | Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

ASK THE EXPERT

Q. A.

with Dan Barouch, M.D., Ph.D.

All the news about the Zika virus is very frightening, particularly because it initially spread so fast. Is there hope for a Zika vaccine in the future?

I have much hope. My team and I have shown that Zika vaccines work in animal studies, and clinical trials are currently underway. We are optimistic that finding a vaccine for Zika is possible. For more than 12 years, my research team at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center has focused on developing and testing a novel vaccine for HIV. Our interest in Zika began in January 2016, when we saw headlines about the virus’s explosive spread in the Americas and its devastating consequences in pregnant women and infants, including microcephaly and congenital and neurological abnormalities. It was immediately clear to us that a vaccine would be needed as a key global health countermeasure. Additionally, we reasoned that the development of a vaccine was a tractable target—which means it will likely be successful—for several reasons. First, Zika virus has much less variability than HIV: each virus particle is nearly identical genetically.

DAN BAROUCH, M.D., PH.D.

Additionally, there is clear evidence of natural protective immunity in humans, as most adults infected with Zika make a full recovery. We tested three different vaccines in mice and subsequently in monkeys, and each one provided 100 percent protection against Zika. The results were astonishing, particularly given that this was a virus that had never been studied before. We worked extremely rapidly: it took our team four months to establish the proof-of-concept in mice, six months to establish our proof-of-concept in monkeys, and ten months to begin our first clinical trial in humans. Our findings in animals were significant, as they were the very first demonstrations of Zika vaccine efficacy in the field. And not only were we able to test candidate vaccines, we also learned the levels of antibodies needed for protection. We could never have made these rapid advances with Zika without the laboratory infrastructure and

knowledge we had from our HIV work. It’s a very different virus than HIV, but the vaccine technology is similar. In my lab, we have experts in all the different areas required to produce and study vaccine candidates. The other element that was essential to our success in developing and testing Zika vaccines was philanthropy. When we started our work on Zika, we had no funding for this project—because the timeline to obtain federal grants is so long—so we relied on flexible philanthropic support for our pre-clinical studies. Those funds were invaluable to our efforts. Today, we are conducting one of three first-in-human studies evaluating a Zika inactivated virus vaccine. We started the clinical trial in November 2016, ten months after we started our Zika work. The purified, inactivated virus vaccine that we are testing—the same type of vaccine as a flu shot—is promising because it’s a well-established type of vaccine for this type of virus and it’s

Director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research

known to be potent. The Clinical Principal Investigator is Dr. Kathryn Stephenson and the trial is being conducted here at the BIDMC Center for Virology and Vaccine Research. The Walter Reed Army Institute of Research is funding the study. When we ask our study participants why they chose to take part in the trial, they often say that they want to do something to help combat the Zika epidemic. Our objective is to tackle critical global health problems and to make a lasting impact on human health. And our data with Zika vaccines give us great optimism that the development of a safe and effective Zika vaccine for humans will likely be possible. 

Beneficiary Benefits A quick and easy way to make a lasting impact If you are passionate about supporting BIDMC’s mission but worry about having enough income during your lifetime, consider designating the medical center as a charitable beneficiary of your retirement plan, life insurance, or donor-advised fund. All it takes is simply filling out the necessary form. The form is entirely separate from your will—which makes this approach a quick and easy way to give to a great cause.

Benefits of making BIDMC a beneficiary include: • Knowing your gift supports BIDMC’s extraordinary patient care, leading-edge research, and exceptional medical education.

• Becoming a member of the Lunn Society and receiving the many benefits of membership.

• Avoiding estate tax because the asset is removed from your estate.

• Having your assets remain in your control for your lifetime.

Giving Matters | www.bidmc.org/giving

For more information on Planned Giving at BIDMC, please contact Noreen Mitchell at noreen.mitchell@bidmc.harvard.edu, or (617) 667-1387, or visit us online at www.bidmc.org/plannedgiving.

Manuel Hidalgo, M.D., Ph.D., and A. James Moser, M.D.

BREAKING THE SILENCE ADVANCES IN CARE AND RESEARCH SHED NEW LIGHT ON PANCREATIC CANCER One morning, Lenny White looked in the mirror and saw jaundiced eyes staring back at him. He checked another mirror to make sure it wasn’t poor lighting and immediately called his internist. Tests quickly revealed a life-altering diagnosis of pancreatic cancer. “I instantly knew the odds of survival weren’t good,” White says. Typically, by the time patients become symptomatic and present clinically with pancreatic cancer, 80 percent are inoperable, which means they cannot have surgery due to metastases or the location of the cancer around major blood vessels. Pancreatic cancer remains one of the most challenging forms of cancer, with an annual death toll of more than 50,000 in the United States, and a survival rate that has improved little over the past 25 years. With only one-fifth of Americans diagnosed with pancreatic cancer surviving for a full year, it is the third leading cause of cancer death in the country, and that statistic is increasing. “More than 70 percent of Americans with potentially curable early-stage pancreatic cancer aren’t even offered surgery,” says A. James Moser, M.D., co-director of the Pancreas and Liver Institute at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and renowned pancreatic surgeon. “That is how bad the rap is for this disease.” According to the chief of BIDMC's Division of General Surgery, Mark Callery, M.D., White was actually one of the lucky ones. Callery successfully performed the Whipple procedure to remove White’s tumor, even though it was wedged between major vessels. “I feel there are two reasons I am here today,” says White. “Number one is God, and number two is God’s assistant, Dr. Callery. It’s as simple as that.” 8

While Callery, Moser, and their colleagues are providing the most comprehensive, advanced care possible for BIDMC patients, philanthropy from those grateful patients is critical as they try to find better solutions for this challenging disease. Thankful for his care, White donated $50,000 to the Callery Pancreatic Cancer Research Fund along with $250,000 to the medical center to advance its top priorities. Among many patient families who have contributed generously to Moser’s efforts for several years, the Alliance of Families Fighting Pancreatic Cancer, the Greg and Cathy Griffith Family Foundation, the John F. Fortney Charitable Pancreatic Cancer Research Group, the Woiner Foundation, and Project Purple have raised nearly $900,000 combined. While all share a painful history of pancreatic cancer, they also share a common passion for finding a cure. Clinicians know the difficulty of identifying and treating pancreatic cancer is two-fold; not only is it an extremely aggressive disease, but it is stealthy, remaining asymptomatic until late stages when it’s very hard to treat. Once established, this cancer is typically resistant to nearly all therapies. “At the genetic level, it is a nasty disease,” says Manuel Hidalgo, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Leon V. & Marilyn L. Rosenberg Clinical Cancer Center and chief of the Division of Hematology and Oncology. “It contains a lot of gene mutations and alters the way a cell behaves in such a fundamental manner that is so hard to control.”

Giving Matters | Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

Researchers in the Pancreatic Cancer Research Program (PCRP) at BIDMC are determined to change these outcomes. Relying on grateful patient support, they are pursuing several new groundbreaking strategies and collaborations to identify biomarkers that could lead to earlier diagnoses and uncover more personalized treatment options. By analyzing each tumor’s genetic makeup and testing therapies through avatar mouse models and patient tumor– derived organoids—threedimensional organ “mini tumors” that are generated from patients’ cancerous tissue and grown in our laboratories—researchers have made tremendous progress in developing methods to deliver the most efficient and precise treatments to patients. “We want to help oncologists make better choices of what drug to give the patient to increase the probability of response,” says Senthil Muthuswamy, Ph.D., director of BIDMC's Cell Biology Program and a pioneer in the development and use of three-dimensional organoid culture methods. “We want to bring cancer treatment at BIDMC to a state where a patient knows that his or her treatment is based on testing done using his or her own tumor cells—a new definition for precision medicine.”

DELIVERING SPECIALIZED, COMPREHENSIVE CARE As a premier academic medical center that specializes in pancreatic cancer, BIDMC often sees the most serious cases and, despite the lack of a cure, has made tangible steps in improving quality of life for patients. When Moser joined the medical center in 2012, he established the multidisciplinary Pancreatic Cancer Program, which allows patients to see all members of their care team in one day. The program offers everything from medical, surgical, or radiation oncology treatment to genetic analysis and counseling, gastroenterology, and advanced radiology, as well as clinical trials teams, palliative care, and nutrition. By centralizing these services, the average time from diagnosis to treatment decreased from 49 days to 13– 15 days. “Multidisciplinary care is important in the not-so-straightforward cases,” Callery says. “We now have patients coming in with borderline resectable tumors that 15 years ago would never have been removed. Now we take them out, but we’ve shifted the position of surgery on the continuum of care.” What Callery means is that clinicians are now starting patients with chemotherapy or radiotherapy to shrink the cancer before surgery. Once in the operating room, BIDMC surgeons, who run the highest volume robotic

Giving Matters | www.bidmc.org/giving

pancreatic surgical center in New England, rely on their experienced assessment and prediction in high-acuity surgery and advanced technical innovations to remove the most challenging cancers. When surgery is not an option, clinical trials featuring the most advanced cancer research strategies are more readily available for patients at the medical center. “The strength of this program is having these components of clinical predictive modeling in pancreatic cancer, which is going to be married to the biological predictive modeling through organoids,” Callery says.

Mark Callery, M.D.

BENCH-TO-BEDSIDE RESEARCH Surgery is still a rare cure for a patient with pancreatic cancer. But it is allowing researchers access to valuable pieces of information—tumor samples. “Every patient we operate on now, we identify biomarkers in parallel so we understand success and failure,” Moser says of the option that is available to every BIDMC patient. Moser is leading an initiative called Project Survival—a worldwide consortium of seven institutions, including the biopharmaceutical company Berg Health. This unique cross-sector collaboration is leading research efforts, including analyzing thousands of patient tumor samples, aimed at identifying diagnostic and treatment biomarkers for the disease. “Project Survival is about finding ways to pinpoint markers of the disease early on. It’s predictive medicine,” Moser says. Project Survival also encompasses several clinical trials for which BIDMC has served as a national leader. “One of the reasons we don’t cure more patients is because we don’t have any early diagnosis,” says Hidalgo. “We are determined to change this.” Until that day comes, the researchers in the PCRP are leading innovative efforts focusing on developing improved treatment options. Hidalgo is a world leader in creating and employing avatar mouse models—also known as patient-derived xenografts. Researchers transplant human tumor tissue into a group of mice and administer a variety of targeted or combined therapies to determine their efficacy in halting the growth of each specific tumor. This established technique is now being used in conjunction with Muthuswamy’s exploration of patient tumor – derived organoids. These mini tumors closely mimic the matched patients’ cancers and are a critical improvement over the traditional method of culturing two– dimensional cells in a petri dish. “We see

CONTINUED ON P. 10 9

tumor cells can be grown in organoids in a matter of weeks. BIDMC has designed a platform allowing for a much larger number of therapies to be tested on the organoids first, and then verified in the mouse models before reaching the patient. “This is the ultimate preclinical model,” says Hidalgo. “We won’t test anything in patients that hasn’t shown success in the organoid.”

CONTINUED FROM P. 9 Senthil Muthuswamy, Ph.D., is a pioneer in the development and use of three-dimensional organoid culture methods.

CONTINUED FROM P. 9

that the tumor organoids respond to some drugs the same way the same tumor responds in a mouse,” Muthuswamy says. “Although we are just beginning to compare organoid response with patient response, we are confident that this will be the way patient treatment decisions are made in the future.” As a complement to Hidalgo’s mouse models, Muthuswamy’s organoid work offers fast and costeffective results. Compared to growing tissue in xenograft models, which takes eight to ten months,

Muthuswamy and Hidalgo are extending the organoid technology to generate a pancreas vaccine program alongside David Avigan, M.D., section chief of Hematologic Malignancies and Bone Marrow Transplantation. With experiments already underway, Muthuswamy, Hidalgo, and Avigan received a $600,000 grant from the V Foundation to support clinical trials that will test vaccines created using organoids within the year. “All of the talent and resources are here. Everything is in place for us to generate vaccines and test in patients,” says Muthuswamy. “That is why philanthropy will make a huge difference in this situation—unlike anything else I have worked on before.” While these innovative platforms will yield better treatment options, the end goal, of course, is to find a cure for pancreatic cancer. “We need people to recognize that what we are doing is unique,” Moser says. “This group of people is highly motivated and, with the right set of donors, will really change the balance.” 

$500K Gift Creates Seminar and Fellowship in Management of Pancreatic Disease

n 2004, Barbara J. Janson and her husband, Arthur R. Hilsinger, were enjoying every moment of their retirement when a routine screening diagnosed Janson with aggressive non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and unrelated pancreatic lesions. Janson, a mathematician and publisher, was shocked: “I had no symptoms whatsoever,” she recalls. Janson’s primary care physician, Barbara Stewart, M.D., referred her to Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, where her care team, led by Lowell Schnipper, M.D., treated her lymphoma. She was cancer-free by 2005. From Janson’s first day at BIDMC, Steven Freedman, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Pancreas Center, monitored her pancreatic lesions. Over six years, he identified mutations, atypical cells, and low-grade dysplasia—all indicators 10

of more cancer to come. Fearing the worst, he suggested a total pancreatectomy, a radical surgical procedure to remove the pancreas, gallbladder, and common bile duct, along with portions of the small intestine, stomach, and spleen. “This surgery was absolutely necessary to save Barbara’s life,” he concluded. Understandably, Janson and Hilsinger were eager to learn as much as possible about the procedure. “Dr. Freedman spent a great deal of time with us discussing the pros and cons,” recalls Hilsinger. They decided to proceed, and in 2010, Mark Callery, M.D., BIDMC’s chief of general surgery, performed the operation. Janson made a speedy recovery but still faces a host of physical challenges brought on by her body’s inability to digest food and produce insulin and glucagon, hormones that regulate blood glucose

Barbara J. Janson and Arthur R. Hilsinger

levels. “Not having a pancreas affects each minute of each day of my life,” she says. Another difficult part of the surgery was the lack of available information for total pancreatectomy patients. Janson considers herself fortunate for access to Freedman’s robust knowledge and vast experience; she texts him whenever she has a question. “We always say we need to clone Steve because he is such a wealth of information,” says Hilsinger. The couple wanted to express their gratitude to Freedman, so together they developed an idea for a fellowship to train young

physicians, or fellows, on post-surgical care for patients like Janson. In July 2016, Janson and Hilsinger made an extraordinary gift of $500,000 to BIDMC to bring the Seminar and Fellowship in Management of Pancreatic Disease to life. Janson and Hilsinger also want their gift to create a network for patients who have undergone a total pancreatectomy to share resources and advice. In addition, they will work with Freedman and the fellow to publish educational materials for patients and families. Says Janson, “We want our gift to help as many people as possible.” 

Giving Matters | Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

Vital Funding Gives Infant Health Research Program a Boost The Judy and Charles H. Hood Family Infant Health Research Program has established itself as a leader in understanding the most vital elements of preterm infant health and nutrition. Managed by Camilia Martin, M.D., M.S., associate director of the Klarman Family Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) and director of cross-disciplinary partnerships in the Division of Translational Research, and Steven Freedman, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Pancreas Center and chief of the Division of Translational Research, the program has led to the identification of key nutritional deficits that result in disease and the creation of novel nutritional supplements and strategies tailored to meet the specialized needs of preterm infants. Two significant gifts are helping Martin and Freedman advance their work to fundamentally change the care and outcomes for preterm infants.

Members of the Hood family visit the Klarman Family NICU.

Kate Lubin, Glen Sutton, and their daughters Estella and Sylvia.

A HOUSEHOLD NAME

DOUBLE THE CARE

The Hood name has been synonymous with healthy milk for more than a century. The late Charles H. Hood II worked in the family’s dairy business and actively supported child health research initiatives. His grandfather, Charles H. Hood pioneered the science of pasteurization in New England to provide safe, nutritious milk—which is vital to childhood development. In 1942, the family established the Charles H. Hood Foundation to support child health researchers and scientists. Charles H. Hood II served as the foundation’s president from 1974 until 2009. “Child health and nutrition were areas of significant investment for the foundation, so this program’s focus on prenatal care, and neonatal nutrition specifically, is right in line with our mission,” says Neil

Seven years ago, Kate Lubin gave birth to twin girls, Estella and Sylvia, at BIDMC. Despite being born at 34 weeks, they had regained their health in the NICU. As Lubin was admitted for preeclampsia, the twins’ care team insisted on keeping them there as a precaution. In the middle of the night, Lubin was awoken by nurses to the scare of a lifetime. Stella wasn’t doing well; there was a chance she might not make it through the night.

Giving Matters | www.bidmc.org/giving

Smiley, Hood II’s nephew and current president of the Charles H. Hood Foundation. In 1954, the Charles H. Hood Foundation made its first grant to BIDMC to support the research of Sidney Gellis, M.D., on amino acid metabolism in children. In 2016, after providing more than $1.1 million cumulatively in support to BIDMC, the family’s longstanding commitment to the medical center came full circle with a remarkable $1 million gift to name the Infant Health Research Program for Charles H. Hood and his family. “It was an honor to name this incredible program after my uncle,” says Smiley. “He was an enthusiastic supporter of BIDMC’s research and passionate about improving the lives of children.”

The NICU team quickly identified that Stella had necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC), a condition where portions of intestinal tissue die, causing severe inflammation. As the second most common cause of death in premature infants, NEC is one of the worst diagnoses any parent can hear.

“I am forever grateful to the NICU staff for having the foresight to keep the girls,” says Lubin. “If they had gone home, we would have never known how sick Stella was. They saved her life.” Upon returning home, Lubin and her husband, Glen Sutton, knew immediately that they wanted to support BIDMC. When they learned about the innovative research being conducted within the Hood Infant Health Research Program, they looked no further. In 2011, the couple gave an incredible $250,000 through the Richard K. Lubin Family Foundation, and more recently in 2016, they donated an additional $300,000, in honor of their daughters, who are now healthy seven-year-olds. “Whether it’s preventing NEC or better treating it, research is our best hope,” says Lubin.  11

Andrew Ahn, M.D., and Chung-Kang Peng, Ph.D.

THINKING INSIDE THE BOX Enterprising researchers design award-winning diagnostic device to make health care access universal Could a portable toolbox transform health care in rural China? For Chung-Kang “CK” Peng, Ph.D., a statistical physicist at BIDMC, the idea is not so far-fetched.

December 2016, the competition was narrowed down to two finalists, one of which was Peng’s Taiwan-based Dynamical Biomarkers Group (DBG).

For the past five years, Peng and his international, multidisciplinary team have worked on building just such a contraption as part of the $10 million Qualcomm Tricorder XPRIZE, which challenged contestants to design and construct a compact, wireless, and user-friendly clinical diagnostics device for the lay consumer. Incorporating Peng’s expertise in non-linear dynamics and complex systems, their novel prototype could hold the key for bringing basic health care to parts of the world that currently have none. “In China, there are about 800 million people who don’t have health care because they live in rural areas and don’t have access to large hospitals,” says Peng. “Imagine if we have a system that can diagnose 50 or 100 diseases and we put one of these systems in one million villages, then we serve a really huge population.”

Getting to the finals was no mean feat. “They didn’t make it too easy for us,” laughs Andrew Ahn, M.D., a BIDMC hospitalist, who acts as DBG’s lead medical advisor. “They forced us to push the boundaries a bit.” For one, the competition's designers were clever in their selection of diseases, requiring the teams to address a range of diverse conditions that can’t be diagnosed with a single technology; some, like atrial fibrillation, require signal monitoring, others, such as ear infections, need imaging, and still others, like anemia, entail blood testing. With the call for more technologies, however, the five-pound weight limit becomes a heavier burden to bear, and creativity becomes the name of the game. For example, DBG adapted the microphone of their unit’s built-in smart phone to analyze a person's exhalation, creating a "spirometer" for measuring lung function to diagnose emphysema.

Encouraging technological development to solve the world’s most pressing problems for the benefit of humanity is the mission of the non-profit XPRIZE. The foundation’s Tricorder challenge takes its name from the futuristic handheld device made famous on the 1960s television series Star Trek, which could diagnose any malady with one swipe over a patient’s body. While the contest’s parameters weren’t quite so ambitious, its intent was clear—to boldly go where no health care tool has gone before. Starting in 2012, nearly 300 participating teams were charged with designing a portable unit weighing less than five pounds that allows the user to effortlessly and accurately monitor five vital signs and diagnose 13 health conditions independent of a health care worker or facility. In 2015, seven teams were selected to build models of their designs, and by

They also applied different lenses to its camera for imaging ear infections and melanoma. In addition, the team members relied on Peng’s expertise in developing algorithms to analyze information over time to make their invention both intelligent enough to make relatively accurate diagnoses and sufficiently user-friendly to do so simply and efficiently—a mere 90 minutes by a untrained, non-medical consumer in the last stage of the contest. “We work with what’s in front of us,” says Peng. “We always think this way.” While ultimately no team successfully met the full requirements to claim the Tricorder Challenge’s $10 million grand prize, DBG took home a $1 million second-place award for its strong performance. However, they had always considered the competition as just a starting point for their efforts. “This is the first generation, which was just to compete, to show the feasibility of our principle,” stresses Peng. “But we want to have a second generation that can actually be used in the field.

Giving Matters | Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

NEWS It’s not meaningful to win the award if you can’t use what you’ve built.” From the beginning, the team members agreed that any prize money they earned would feed back into developing and testing their toolbox. Already they are exploring ways to incorporate diagnostics for more conditions into their unit and are in discussions with governments in Asia and Africa to potentially run trials of their system in locations with minimal health care access. And while the latter is an agenda close to the heart of this international team, their ultimate goal is to improve health technologies for all patients in need, be it across the globe or around the corner. Unfortunately, $1 million doesn’t go as far as it used to when transforming health care as we know it. That’s why Peng and his colleagues’ efforts have relied on philanthropy, which will continue to be instrumental in moving their work forward. In addition to the smartphone manufacturing company HTC, which sponsored the design and building of the DBG’s XPRIZE prototype, the team has received support from a variety of donors who have been inspired by the innovative nature of its

research. “The reason why we appeal to these donors is that we agitate the system. We figure out how we can actually move health care into that next stage,” says Peng. “And you probably notice that a lot of our money comes from Taiwan and China because I believe those will be the places where you can implement these technologies and start this evolution first.” A health subsidiary of a large Chinese energy company, Ovation Health Institute has invested $500,000 to support the team’s cross-disciplinary research and to explore the integration of traditional Chinese medicine concepts and practices into their toolbox. Largan Health Technology, the health division of a major supplier of camera lenses for smartphones and digital cameras, made a $600,000 gift to support their cross-disciplinary work, as well as make the interface with this type of technology more user-friendly. And the Delta Environmental & Educational Foundation in Taiwan has donated almost $350,000 to sustain the group’s innovative training program, which brings students from China and Taiwan in diverse specialties ranging from engineering to physics to medicine to study in Peng’s lab for a year.

Peng and Ahn believe that this type of intuitive philanthropy and the comprehensive research and teaching environment of an academic medical center will be critical to bringing their dreams to fruition. Of course, they are dreaming big—from applying machine learning techniques so that doctors can train computers to become increasingly better diagnosticians, to incorporating social, environmental, and behavioral factors that influence health into their algorithms, to improving their analysis of vital signs continuously over time to get more accurate assessments. They are even in talks with a company that makes drones to determine the feasibility of delivering medications to isolated areas by these unmanned mini-aircrafts once a diagnosis via their toolbox is made. “It’s not that we are trying to supplant the doctor’s role, we are trying to supplement it,” says Ahn, noting that much of their work has equal applicability to patients in the U.S. as routine care increasingly leaves the hospital setting. “This technology lends itself to putting big data into context and hopefully empowering the patient and the community in the process so that they can become proactive in their own care.” 

OF NOTE HOT SHOT In its early-phase testing, an investigational preventive HIV vaccine developed by Dan Barouch, M.D., Ph.D., and his team in the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research was both well tolerated and triggered the desired antibody response in 100 percent of healthy volunteers, meeting the advancement criteria for a larger phase 3 trial. Funded jointly by the National Institutes of Health and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, this large-scale study will be only the fifth clinical efficacy trial of an HIV vaccine concept in 35 years. SYSTEM GROWTH The Beth Israel Deaconess system has signed a definitive agreement with Lahey Health and New England Baptist, Mount Auburn, and Anna Jaques Hospitals to move toward establishing a combined health system that will deliver high-quality, efficient care to patients throughout Eastern Massachusetts and will include 13 hospitals, more than 800 primary care physicians, and more than 3,500 specialists. CULTURE SHOCK Neel Shah, M.D., and Toni Golen, M.D., in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology published a landmark study showing that the culture of the labor and delivery ward— influenced by management, technology, and design—can be a defining factor in the wide variation of C-section delivery rates from hospital to hospital. They believe changing this culture could be key to reducing national C-section rates, potentially lowering the risk of complications such as hemorrhage and infection.

Health Tools: The Next Generation: Weighing less than five pounds, the Dynamical Biomarkers Group’s “tricorder” allows a lay user to monitor five vital signs and diagnose 13 health conditions, wirelessly uploading the readings to the Cloud for analysis via a built-in smart phone.

Giving Matters | www.bidmc.org/giving

GUIDING LIGHT A research team led by Lev T. Perelman, Ph.D., director of the Center for Advanced Biomedical Imaging and Photonics, has developed a new light-scattering optical device that is able to distinguish cancerous and non-cancerous cysts of the pancreas with 95 percent accuracy compared to the 58 percent accuracy of the current test. This minimally invasive tool could one day help better guide decision-making in pancreatic cancer treatment, avoiding unnecessary surgery.

Sally B. Fand, M.D., and her daughter, BIDMC anesthesiologist Joan E. Spiegel, M.D.

BLAZING A NEW TRAIL Fand Family Foundation establishes endowed BIDMC chair with major gift

hen Sally B. Fand, M.D., enrolled in the University of Chicago Medical School in 1948, she was one of only six women in her class. “There weren’t many women, but I always knew I wanted to be a physician,” Fand says. “I was lucky enough to do well in school and get into medical school.” Fand graduated and later completed her residency in internal medicine at the University of North Carolina. Now, after a successful career as a clinical investigator and 20 years as a family physician, Fand is making sure other young clinicians are afforded a similar opportunity of quality medical education. In response to the outstanding care Fand received as a patient at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, the Fand Family Foundation recently pledged $2 million to establish the David I. and Sally B. Fand Endowed Chair at BIDMC. Reed Drews, M.D., director of the Hematology–

Oncology Fellowship Program and Fand’s physician, is the first incumbent to the chair named after Fand and her late husband. An endowed BIDMC chair is a position designed to foster pioneering work conducted by a member of the BIDMC community. The gift is also a testament to Sally and David’s influential clinical and academic careers in medicine and economics, respectively. “As I get older I think philanthropy is more important,” she says, recalling the clinical investigator position she held as a young physician at the Veteran’s Association in Dallas, which was partially supported by private funds. “When young clinicians come to BIDMC and learn in the midst of all these wonderful physicians, they need some help.” For 20 years in his role as director of the Division of Hematology– Oncology's fellows, Drews has been dedicated to mentoring and training

future generations of hematologists and medical oncologists. The support from this endowment will provide him, and future leaders in his role, the resources to educate young physicians to provide superior care for patients like Fand. “I met some wonderful young clinicians at the hospital in all kinds of departments,” says Fand, who saw Drews during her successful fight with chronic lymphocytic leukemia. “The people in the program that I met are better because of Dr. Drews and that is a reflection of how he teaches them. I hope this gift allows him to create an even better learning environment for his fellows.” The three-year Hematology– Oncology Fellowship Program welcomes six fellows per year and features a robust clinical and research component. Given the spectrum of patients Drews treats, the fellows have a broad exposure to malignant as well as non-malignant hematology.

Reed Drews, M.D.

“Hematology–oncology is a tremendously exciting area. There has been a lot of discovery, a lot of new drugs, and patients are living longer than they ever did before,” says Drews, who has been in charge of the program since 1997. “Three years of training to learn that extensive body of knowledge sets the stage for lifelong learning. A goal of the fellowship program is to equip the fellows with the principles that are going to put them in good stead for a lifetime.” 

Giving Matters | Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

ON THE SCENE 1

PALM BEACH March 1, 2017

Trustee Emerita Sandy Kurson and Donald Kurson hosted our annual Palm Beach celebration, which showcased the medical center’s excellence in cardiac care and research. The program emphasized the work of four physician leaders in the field: Loryn Feinberg, M.D., Robert Gerszten, M.D., Kamal Khabbaz, M.D., and Peter Zimetbaum, M.D. The distinguished panel featured Sam Kennedy, president and CEO of the Boston Red Sox and member of the Trustee Advisory Board; Pam Lesser, vice chair of the Trustee Advisory Board; Susan Wornick, former WCVB-TV anchor and member of the Board of Overseers; and Mark Zeidel, M.D., chair of the BIDMC Department of Medicine. 1 2 3 4

Sam Kennedy, Kevin Tabb, M.D., Sandy and Donald Kurson Leonard and Sara Aronson J. Jacques Carter, M.D., M.P.H., Alexa Boer Kimball, M.D., M.P.H. Dena and Marty Trust

BOSTON MARATHON April 17, 2017 On Patriot’s Day, Team BIDMC participated in the 121st Boston Marathon as an official nonprofit partner of John Hancock. More than 60 runners, including BIDMC employees, family members, and grateful patients, raised nearly $600,000—$100,000 more than the previous year—to benefit a variety of medical center causes, from community health programs to groundbreaking research, and our affiliates. 7

8 5 6 7 8

Phillomin (Philly) Laptiste Mark Ealey Michael Firestone Siripanth Nippita, M.D.

CRITICAL VOICES May 2, 2017

BIDMC’s Board of Overseers hosted its annual Critical Voices event, which showcased our renowned excellence in heart health and was co-chaired by Matthew and Kathleen Consigli. The engaging program, Who Wants to Be an Innovator, was hosted by former WBZ-TV anchor Scott Wahle and highlighted BIDMC’s expert physicians in cardiovascular medicine and surgery. Game show contestants included Pam Lesser, vice chair of the Trustee Advisory Board; Elliot Chaikof, M.D., Ph.D., chair of the Roberta and Stephen R. Weiner Department of Surgery; Travis McCready, member of the Trustee Advisory Board; and Alexa Boer Kimball, M.D., M.P.H., president and CEO of Harvard Medical Faculty Physicians at BIDMC. 9 10 11 12

Giving Matters | www.bidmc.org/giving

Scott Wahle, Elliot Chaikof, M.D., Ph.D. Matthew and Kathleen Consigli Travis McCready, Carol F. Anderson Tom DeSimone, Danielle Remis Hackel 15

Office of Development 330 Brookline Avenue (OV) Boston, MA 02215

www.bidmc.org/giving

CLEMENS HAD A BALL AT BIDMC RECEPTION In November, Red Sox legend Roger Clemens joined more than 220 attendees for BIDMC’s Community Connections Reception in the State Street Pavilion at Fenway Park. Hosted by the Office of System Development and Strategy, this annual gathering is an opportunity for face-to-face interaction among physician and clinical leaders across the growing BID system. Afterwards Clemens tweeted: “Enjoyed being back @fenwaypark for my 2nd year in support of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center - The Official Hospital of The @RedSox. Great event with even greater people!” t

Roger Clemens, DeWayne Pursley, M.D., M.P.H.

BETH ISRAEL DEACONESS MEDICAL CENTER

WINTER 2017— 18

Paying It Forward “BIDMC saved my life, and Windows of Hope saved my spirit.” — Marie

Aloisi

After enduring five cancer diagnoses and subsequent treatments over three decades, BIDMC grateful patient Marie Aloisi has never been more determined to give back. p

Marie Aloisi and her husband, Joe

In June 2009, Aloisi began to lose her hair as a result of her treatment. She visited Windows of Hope at BIDMC, a nonprofit specialty shop for patients with cancer, to find a wig. To Aloisi’s dismay, wigs were not covered by her insurance. Linda Myers, the store manager, offered her a wig at no charge. Overwhelmed with gratitude, Aloisi was determined to pay it forward as soon as she got better.

Aloisi is doing just that. To date, she has organized four successful fundraisers to benefit Windows of Hope and has raised more than $40,000 in total. Her most recent event, held on October 15, 2017, featured both live and silent auctions as well as a raffle. Sidhu Gangadharan, M.D., chief of thoracic surgery and interventional pulmonology at BIDMC—who in 2009 operated for nine hours to remove the lower lobe of Aloisi’s left lung and most of her esophagus— performed with his band. “BIDMC saved my life, and Windows of Hope saved my spirit,” says Aloisi. Through her generous acts of giving back, Aloisi is doing the same for countless patients with cancer.

Giving Matters - Winter 2017-18