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Country Health Systems Research
Short-Term Medical Missions
- HMI has supported Harvard Medical School (HMS) student research focusing on the cost effectiveness and quality associated with Short-Term Medical Missions (STMM) whereby brigades of volunteer physicians, nurses, allied health professionals and others travel to severely resource constrained communities in Central and South America as well as Africa to provide directly different types of medical and surgical care, such as cleft lip and palate or orthopedic surgery for children.Led by one recent HMS graduate, Dr. Ben White, teams of HMS students during their first and second years have conducted audits of STMM’s, using a tool developed by Dr. White, with the support of HMI’s Drs. Kleefield and Crone. Three abstracts have been presented describing the tool, a website for inputing and collating data has been developed and supported by HMI and the first article describing some of the findings has been submitted for publication.
HIV/AIDs
- Dr. Harvey Makadon worked with Dr. Todd Pollack and Dr. Joe Hardman (HMS residents from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center) to design and obtain IRB approval for a study in Mumbai to assess physician’s knowledge of HIV and their attitudes toward HIV patients. The work has been presented at Research Day at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Dr. Jehangir Sorabjee was the local mentor for the residents working in Mumbai.
- Ms Lakshmi Nambiar from MIT worked under the supervision of Dr. Harvey Makadon in 2006, to design and carry out a survey of HIV awareness in Dharavi, the largest slum in Mumbai. She was sponsored by the WHARF program in India (An HMI/Wockhardt Hospital HIV education program for healthcare professionals). Ms. Nambiar is currently writing up her findings for publication. Her work has already been used to inform the work of WHARF.
- Kyle Staller, student at HMS, worked under the supervision of Dr. Harvey Makadon to design a survey and obtain IRB approval to conduct a survey about attitudes to HIV in a Masai tribal community in Kenya during the summer of 2006. The findings are being written up for publication.
- Anatole Menon-Johannson is a Harkness Fellow of the Commonwealth Fund from the UK who Dr. Makadon mentored during his 18 months in the US as he studied the systems for HIV prevention and treatment in the US and comparing them to the UK. He worked on a model focusing in on the wealthiest and the poorest states and comparing the two in the US with respect to HIV prevention efforts.
OB-GYN
- Research with Boston University PhD student to develop and training program for identifying international performance measurements in hospitals, with specific training in how to define and collect data, as well as risk adjustment strategies when appropriate.
The Dubai Harvard Foundation for Medical Research was created to help drive scientific inquiry and discovery that will address the Middle East’s most pressing health problems, and to train scientific leaders who will help to build an infrastructure for biomedical research in the Middle East. The Foundation will fund the first research center and postgraduate education programs at Harvard Medical School in addition to funding a collaborative research center in the Middle East. The Foundation also sponsors an annual scientific conference – the first of these “Today’s Science, Tomorrow’s Cure” was held in Dubai in March 2006. The conference had a distinguished faculty from the Harvard medical community led by Dr. Joseph Martin and was attended by the UAE Minister of Health and 600-700 researchers and faculty from the region. In January 2007, in partnership with regional universities, the Foundation hosted a “Strategy for Science: Young Investigators Conference” in Dubai. At this event, over 70 young scientists who are pursuing their education and research in the Middle East, and abroad took part in a discussion on the potential for building scientific infrastructure in the region.
A Scientific Advisory Committee has been established consisting of senior faculty from Harvard Medical School science and clinical departments and from the Gulf Region. The Advisory Board members are responsible for designing and monitoring the success of scientific and clinical programs relating to the Dubai Harvard Foundation for Medical Research and its mission. All program proposals and recommendations are submitted to the Board of Trustees for approval.
PABSELA: The Program for the Advancement of Biomedical Sciences in Latin America offers training opportunities for graduate students in Latin America and to promote the exchange of scientists with the United States in the biomedical sciences field. The program has been developed in collaboration with the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and the Fundación Instituto Leloir, a prestigious research center in Argentina. PABSELA is an innovative program being developed by Drs. Miguel Velardez and Estanislao Bachrach, two Argentine research fellows at Children’s Hospital. The program's objectives are to: (1) enhance training capabilities of Harvard University graduate students and host university teachers in stem cell biology and other new technologies; (2) train Latin American graduate students in stem cell biology and other new technologies; and (3) advance the ties between Harvard University and Latin American universities. The long-term goal of PABSELA is to contribute to the development of the Latin American biomedical community by providing unique educational and research opportunities for scientists and graduate students. The program is being developed in collaboration with distinguished faculty associated with the Harvard Stem Cell Institute. Click here to view the 2007 report.
Harvard Medical School Dubai Center (HMSDC) Institute for Postgraduate Education and Research at Dubai Healthcare City (DHCC) is in the process of establishing the Office for Research Administration (ORA) and the Research Council which will govern the conduct of clinical research at DHCC. The Office for Research Administration, under the governance of the Research Council, will oversee the implementation of all policies and procedures for research activities and serve as the central office for research support and training. HMSDC will serve as a reference center for all those wishing to engage in research activities to better understand Good Clinical Practice, research bioethics and human subject protection and safety.
Country Health Systems Research
HMI collects core health care and medical education data for all major countries where there are or have been substantive relationships. This information covers major areas of morbidity and mortality, staffing and facilities for health care delivery and medical education, and in some cases stated aims for the health care system. The data is collected from a variety of publicly available sources including WHO, the UN, the World Bank, the ministries of health and other government departments from the country in question, and a variety of journals. In addition, HMI has a partnership with MEDEX, a US-based medical evacuation company to collect basic healthcare system information and health risk information for 236 countries.
