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February 02, 2007
To develop more successful drugs, you have to look at both the winners and the losers. But that means drug companies need to share their gold mine of information on unsuccessful medicines, two researchers from Children's Hospital Boston's Informatics Program say.
Based on information about failed drugs, Dr. Asher D. Schachter and Marco F. Ramoni say they can predict which drugs in early development will be safe and effective.
They make that case in the February Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, saying their model could help save $283 million per approved drug.
"Suppressing negative data harms everyone," Schachter said. "Companies could reduce drug development costs and pass on some of those savings to the consumer."
Schachter and Ramoni just founded Phorecaster, a consulting business that has no customers or profits yet.
Schachter, a pediatric nephrologist, said to create their forecasting model they looked at data about early-stage drugs described in publications from the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development and other public sources.
They were able to predict success in phase 3 trials and new-drug-application approval with 78 percent accuracy, they said.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 02:31 PM
February 02, 2007
Dr. Michael F. Epstein, executive vice president and chief operating officer of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, is leaving the hospital after five years.
Before coming to Beth Israel to work with CEO Paul Levy on a recovery plan for the then financially troubled hospital, he was a neonatologist and later COO and chief medical officer at Children's Hospital Boston.
The goals of the recovery plan have been achieved with Beth Israel's return to financial stability, he said in a memo to employees. His resignation will be effective May 1.
"There is no other position or job offer that would have lured me away from BIDMC," he wrote. "But the celebration of my 60th birthday a little over a year ago reminded me that there are important connections to family members and friends to nurture, places to visit, books to read, gardens to plant, and marathons to run, and since that birthday, the clock seems to be running a bit more rapidly. So, while the work continues to be exciting and engaging, I have decided it is now time to move on."
Epstein is "a terrific person," Levy said. "I was incredibly lucky to have him with us."
with us.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 09:05 AM
February 02, 2007
Plagued by post-concussion syndrome and battling an amphetamine addiction, former Patriots linebacker Ted Johnson is a shell of his former self.
Researchers at the University of Michigan have discovered a small population of stem cells in pancreatic cancer that appear to drive tumor growth, opening the door for a potential new approach for treating this particularly deadly disease.
The CDC's pandemic guidelines mean states should be prepared to keep children out of school for three months, businesses should be ready to operate with skeleton workforces, children should be prepared to play mostly with their siblings, and parents should be ready to lose income as they skip work and cobble together child-care arrangements.
Despite FDA approval, breast implants are still not safe, Dallas plastic surgeon Dr. Edward Melmed and Our Bodies Ourselves executive director Judy Norsigian write in an op-ed piece.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 06:27 AM
February 01, 2007
Massachusetts spent $234.2 million on health care last year for people who worked at some of the state's largest employers but did not have insurance. That's 10 percent more than last year.
MassHealth and the state's uncompensated care pool paid for 166,000 workers and their dependents -- up 4 percent -- to get care in 2005, according to a report from the Executive Office of Health and Human Services. The employers, all with 50 or more employees, either did not offer insurance plans or the workers did not use them.
"As of last year, we were still moving backwards in terms of large employers providing coverage," said Brian Rosman, director of policy and planning for the advocacy group Health Care for All. "It reflects the national trends of employers making it harder for workers to get insurance and looking to public programs to solve their health insurance problems."
Stop & Shop topped the list, with $8.9 million paid by the state in health care for its employees. Wal-mart came next, at $8.4 million, and McDonald's was third at $5.3 million.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 05:23 PM
February 01, 2007
About 1,100 unionized nurses at Tufts-New England Medical Center have ratified a new contract that includes wage increases of between 11 and 16 percent over two years, depending on experience. The highest hourly wage for nurses will rise to $58.23, from $52.23.
The contract, made public today by the Massachusetts Nurses Association, will be in effect through Oct. 31, 2008. It also establishes a retiree health insurance savings account, which will be funded through contributions from employees and the hospital.
- Christopher Rowland
Posted by Karen Weintraub at 02:43 PM
February 01, 2007
Scientists have released the most comprehensive set of rules yet to govern the ethically charged field of embryonic stem cell research.
The guidelines, put together by the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR) under the direction of Children’s Hospital Boston scientist Dr. George Q. Daley, calls for special oversight of embryonic stem cell research.
Dr. George Q. Daley, Children's Hospital Boston
The guidelines are very similar to a report issued in 2005 by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, but are designed to apply to scientists around the world, not just American scientists.
The rules include bans on: growing human embryos in a dish for more than 14 days; breeding animals which might have human eggs or sperm; and, using cloning technology in an attempt to create a live human child. All are widely viewed as anathema by stem cell researchers today.
Embryonic stem cell research has been controversial because scientist break apart human embryos – which some consider to be human lives – in order to obtain the stem cells. This is typically done using frozen embryos that would otherwise be discarded by fertility clinics. It has also been controversial because some scientists, including Daley, plan to use cloning.
Critics charge that this means scientists are creating human embryos with plans to destroy them. Defenders counter that the technique will allow them to study diseases in entirely new ways.
The ISSCR panel was divided on another hot-button ethical issue: Whether researchers should be allowed to pay woman to donate eggs for research. Fertility clinics pay, but scientists have shied away from the practice.
The guidelines have no legal force, but the authors called on the editors of top scientific journals to make following the rules a prerequisite for publication. A summary of the guidelines appears in the current issue of the journal Science.
-Gareth Cook
Posted by Karen Weintraub at 12:21 PM
February 01, 2007
Massachusetts medical schools and teaching hospitals rank fourth in the nation for economic impact in their states.
Together the schools and hospitals generate $29 billion in direct and indirect spending in Massachusetts, behind New York, Pennsylvania and California, according to a report by the Association of American Medical Colleges. The group's analysts determined that for every $1 spent by a medical school or teaching hospital in 2005, an additional $1.30 was spent on other businesses or individuals.
Nationwide AAMC members had a combined economic impact of $451 billion.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 11:57 AM
February 01, 2007
Binge eating disorder affects more American adults than anorexia and bulimia combined, a study from McLean Hospital and Harvard Medical School finds, making it a "major public health problem."
Binge eating behavior also tends to last longer, spanning about eight years compared with an average of 1.7 years for anorexia, the Harvard authors write in Biological Psychiatry.
About 5.9 million people in the United States could have a binge eating disorder at some point in their life, Dr. James I. Hudson and his co-authors say. That compares with 1.3 million cases of anorexia and 2.1 million cases of bulimia, based on data from the National Comorbidity Survey Replication. The survey asked 9,000 people across the United Sates about their mental health.
Binge eating, defined as repeated bouts of uncontrolled eating, appears to be a cause for severe obesity. People with anorexia fear being overweight so much that they eat very little. Bulimics overeat but vomit after to avoid weight gain.
Binge eaters continue to gain weight, becoming morbidly obese, with a body mass index of 40 or greater. For a 5-foot-6-inch woman, that BMI would mean 248 pounds; for a 5-foot-9-inch man, 270 pounds.
"If we can identify and treat the underlying cause of this behavioral disturbance, we may be able to make an impact on the obesity epidemic," Hudson said. "This is a major public health problem."
Hudson reported receiving funding for the eating disorders analysis from OrthoMcNeil Neurologics, which has tested its antiepilepsy drug, topiramate, for effectiveness in binge eating disorder.
The national survey's funders included Eli Lilly and Co.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 07:08 AM
February 01, 2007
A woman who worked for the state's largest Catholic hospital chain for 20 years filed a sexual harassment complaint against former Caritas chief executive Dr. Robert Haddad. In it she spells out what she said occurred over 15 months and ended when she was laid off, allegedly in retaliation for complaining to hospital executives.
Lavender and tea tree oils found in some shampoos, soaps, and lotions can temporarily leave boys with enlarged breasts in rare cases, apparently by disrupting their hormonal balance, a preliminary study suggests.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 06:26 AM
January 31, 2007
Stricter control of air pollution is needed to reduce the risk of heart disease in women, two Harvard researchers write in an editorial to be published in tomorrow’s New England Journal of Medicine.
Their comments accompany a study in the journal that shows long-term exposure to the fine particles in air pollution are more harmful to older women than previously known, raising their risk of heart disease and death.
Researchers from the University of Washington reviewed medical records from more than 65,000 postmenopausal women with no previous history of heart disease who participated in a long-running, federally funded study called the Women’s Health Initiative.
Other studies have shown a connection between fine particles in air pollution and death. But the pairing of the detailed medical records with data from air monitors in the 36 US cities where the women lived, revealed that women who breathed in more fine particles over a period averaging six years increased their chances of having heart attacks, strokes, blocked arteries and other illnesses. And the risk depended on the level of fine-particulate pollution in the area of the city where they lived.
"The findings of the WHI study strongly support the recommendations for tighter standards for long-term fine particulate air pollution," said Douglas W. Dockery of the Harvard School of Public Health and Peter H. Stone of Brighams and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, writing in the editorial.
They noted that the US Environmental Protection Agency had recently lowered the standard for exposure to fine particles in the air over a 24-hour period but had declined to reduce the standard for longer-term exposure. Dockery and Stone called on the EPA to adopt a tighter standard, which has also been recommended by the agency's science advisers.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 05:45 PM
January 31, 2007
Listening more and talking less really does make a difference, not only for intensive care patients but also for their loved ones.
A UMass Memorial Medical Center physician lauds as "groundbreaking" a French study appearing in tomorrow’s New England Journal of Medicine that looks at how ICU doctors communicate with families.
Previous studies have shown that even desperately ill people do better when the goals of treatment, whether that means aggressive care or comfort measures only, are well explained and understood. But no one had looked at how communication affects relatives of patients dying in the ICU.
"The French study is groundbreaking because it shows if we spend a little bit more time, mostly listening to patients and their families, the well-being of survivors of patients who die is going to be better," Dr. Craig M. Lilly of UMass Memorial said in an interview. He comments in a New England Journal editorial, "The Healing Power of Listening in the ICU."
Dr. Alexandre Lautrette and a team of researchers in France tested levels of stress and depression in two groups of survivors. One group had standard end-of-life conferences, but the intervention group had longer sessions in which they did more of the talking. Follow-up telephone interviews showed lower levels of stress, anxiety and depression in the group that had longer conferences and more time to talk.
"All providers of critical care should receive training that will allow them to offer the kind of support that they would want if they had a family member who was facing death in an ICU," Lilly wrote in his editorial.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 05:00 PM
January 31, 2007
Exercise makes no difference for the risk of osteoarthritis of the knee, Dr. David T. Felson and colleagues at Boston University School of Medicine report in the February issue of Arthritis Care and Research.
They studied 1,279 people from the Framingham Offspring cohort, beginning in the early 1990s. The results showed no relationship between recreational walking, jogging or other activity and developing knee osteoarthritis. Even in overweight patients who were at higher risk for osteoarthritis, exercise didn't raise or lower the risk.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 08:47 AM
January 31, 2007
Paul Levy has harsh words for the new joint program for liver transplantation between Lahey Clinic and UMass Memorial Medical Center. Both transplant centers will continue to function independently, with surgeons operating in Burlington and Worcester, undermining the promise of collaboration, he writes in his blog today.
"I cannot imagine how asking Lahey doctors to commute to Worcester for a relatively small liver transplantation program will be a good use of their time or will optimize patient care and control costs overall," Levy says. He is president and CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, which has its own liver transplant program.
Levy welcomed word that Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center on the New Hampshire-Vermont border may be canceling plans for its own liver transplantation program because there would be too few patients.
Dartmouth-Hitchcock denied that suggestion.
"DHMC will not be expanding its solid organ transplant program to include liver transplants at this time, but no final decisions have been made," hospital spokesman Jason E. Aldous said.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 06:48 AM
January 31, 2007
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute plans to raise $1 billion for research and patient care, the largest hospital fund-raising campaign in New England history.
Tufts Health Plan will reduce its staff by about 10 percent, laying off about 100 people and leaving about 75 jobs vacant.
In a pilot program the Food and Drug Administration will issue drug safety report cards detailing unexpected side effects that emerge within 18 months of a drug's approval.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 06:47 AM
January 30, 2007
More Boston hospital workers may be getting flu shots this season than the national average, but beyond that it’s hard to figure out how they measure up.
Public health officials have been pushing for virtually all hospital workers to get flu shots because they can easily be exposed and infect vulnerable patients. But each of six hospitals that answered a White Coat Notes query today counts health care workers involved in direct patient care in its own way. And they don’t necessarily know who might have gotten a flu shot outside their hospitals' programs.
Here are the results:
Boston Medical Center: 71 percent
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute: 63 percent
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center: 60 percent
Massachusetts General Hospital: 59 percent
Brigham and Women’s Hospital: about 48 percent
Tufts-New England Medical Center: more than 50 percent, according to a preliminary count
"The national average is 38 percent," said Dr. Robert Goldszer, associate chief medical officer at Brigham and Women’s. "We feel we’re doing better than average, but we know we don’t have an accurate rate."
Beth Israel has a broad definition of who comes into direct contact with patients. It’s not just the people who have day-to-day hands-on contact, but it also includes people who see patients face-to-face, such as ward secretaries, people who sit at the front desk in clinics, and workers who clean floors in patients’ rooms, said Dr. Sharon Wright, director of the infection control and hospital epidemiology program.
Beth Israel tries to track who gets a flu shot elsewhere, she said, asking employees to use an internal web site to state explicitly why they are declining to get a flu shot.
The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations requires hospitals to at least offer flu shots. The Infectious Diseases Society of America recommends that hospitals and other health care facilities mandate flu shots for employees, except for religious or medical reasons.
"JCAHO told us to immunize 100 percent of health care workers who don’t have a contraindication," Beth Israel's Wright said. "We’re trying to get to that 100 percent in three to five years. The goal this year was 60 percent and we did it."
Dr. Al DeMaria, assistant commissioner of the state Department of Public Health, said health care workers are exposed to the flu more often, they are difficult to replace if they get sick, and they put their patients at risk if they have the flu.
"Obviously we think everybody should get vaccinated against the flu, but it’s especially important for health care workers," he said.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 08:32 PM
January 30, 2007
Brigham and Women's Hospital is trying to replenish its cardiology staff, after outside recruiters raided the department last year. The Brigham, which particularly needs a strong cardiology department as it prepares to open a $350 million cardiovascular wing next year, lost six, or 10 percent, of its 50 cardiologists last year.
They were lured away by private medical companies and by Case Western Reserve University Medical School and its affiliated University Hospitals of Cleveland, which are trying to compete with the Cleveland Clinic -- world renowned for its heart care and research.
In response, Brigham executives have gone on their own head-hunting spree, hiring three cardiologists who will start their new jobs in the next few months.
The Brigham hired two doctors from Caritas St. Elizabeth's Medical Center -- Dr. Frederick Welt, director of St. Elizabeth's cardiac catheterization lab, and Dr. Pinak Shah -- and Dr. Judy Mangion from Hartford Hospital in Connecticut.
Caritas fired back, hiring away Dr. Jeffrey Popma, director of interventional cardiology at the Brigham.
Brigham executives say they don't need to replace all the doctors who left, because the new physicians will spend more of their time seeing patients, and a little less on research, and because of a slight slowdown in cardiac catheterization cases.
Case Western last year recruited Dr. Daniel Simon as its new chief of cardiology. Dr. Mukesh Jain and Dr. James Fang also signed on for high-level positions, and three Brigham cardiology fellows headed west as well.
At Case Western, the Harvard doctors have made a big splash. Overnight patients in the hospitals' cardiac services have jumped 25 percent, Simon said. The Brigham doctors also brought a significant amount of research funding with them -- about $4.5 million -- most of which they brought from the Brigham.
Simon said he left the Brigham not because of dissatisfaction with his employer, but because of the tremendous opportunity offered by Case Western's new medical school dean and the hospital system's new chief executive, who promised $20 million to hire doctors and researchers for a new cardiovascular institute.
-- Liz Kowalczyk
Posted by Gideon Gil at 02:15 PM
January 30, 2007
Boston researchers have won two of 12 two-year contracts from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to study major diseases that affect post-menopausal women. The groups will use blood samples and data from the massive Women's Health Initiative to see what factors are important in predicting and preventing heart disease. The 12 grants will total $18.7 million.
Dr. I-Min Lee, Dr. JoAnn Manson and Dr. Howard D. Sesso of Brigham and Women's Hospital hope to tease out the biochemical mechanisms behind physical activity and lower body fat, looking for the way they reduce the risk of heart disease.
Dr. Alice Lichtenstein of the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University wants to see how certain biomarkers compare with self-reports of food intake as predictors of heart disease.
Lee's team will focus on inflammatory markers, including c-reactive protein, in blood samples to look beyond known risk factors such as high blood pressure, cholesterol and insulin sensitivity.
She's interested in the protective effect of physical activity, particularly in overweight people.
"We know it's very hard for people to lose weight once they become heavy, but there are some studies that say even if you are heavy but physically active, you lower your risk," she said. "We want to understand that mechanism."
At Tufts, Lichtenstein will measure certain proteins in blood samples to see how well they predict risk for heart disease. Samples will come from 1,200 women who died of cardiovascular disease during the 15-year WHI study. Those will be compared with samples from 1,200 women who did not die.
She'll be looking for two kinds of fatty acids and two forms of vitamin K that have been associated with either an increased or decreased risk for heart disease: omega-3s vs. trans fatty acids and natural vitamin K vs. the kind formed when fat is hydrogenated.
After seeing if those biomarkers are linked to heart disease, she will compare them with food diaries to see which is the better predictor.
"We'll look at biomarkers to see if they are good predictors of outcome," she said. "If they are actually validated, then they can be used in a broad range of applications.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 11:02 AM
January 30, 2007
Some people are better than others at vetting research submitted for publication in medical journals, but it can be hard to tell who they are. A survey reported in PLoS Medicine says there are few ways to spot training or experience that make a difference.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 10:38 AM
January 30, 2007
More than 200,000 people who already have health insurance may need to buy more to meet proposed minimum standards under the state's new health insurance law.
Tiny North Adams has blazed a trail to electronic medical records that can be viewed by health care providers across the community, with lessons for larger cities trying to do the same.
Some babies' brains bleed after vaginal births, researchers detected.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 06:13 AM
January 30, 2007
Fighting cancer under 40 raises special challenges, the first of which is believing it can happen to you. Dr. Karen Albritton of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Dr. Bruce A. Chabner of Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center and Dr. Nadine Tung of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center comment in a New York Times story.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 06:11 AM
January 30, 2007
About 800 students encountered mistakes -- questions on songbirds after a passage about robotic fish, for example -- on the Medical College Admission Test last weekend, the first time the test was administered only by computer rather than by paper and pencil, according to a story in today's New York Times.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 06:10 AM
January 30, 2007
Researchers at the Joslin Diabetes Center have identified a group of proteins that may cause blood vessels to leak in the eyes of people who have diabetic eye disease.
Edward Feener and his team report in Sunday's online edition of Nature Medicine on the molecules that may play a role in the two leading causes of vision loss among adults. Their work could have implications for blood vessel leakage and cerebral swelling involved in head injury or stroke.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 06:09 AM
January 29, 2007
MIT provost L. Rafael Reif sent a campus-wide e-mail today defending the school's treatment of James L. Sherley, the African-American stem cell scientist who has vowed to go on a hunger strike Feb. 5 unless the university says he was denied tenure because of racism.
Confidential tenure discussions cannot be disclosed, Reif wrote, but he itemized three faculty reviews of the 2005 decision not to consider Sherley for tenure. Based on those reviews, Reif wrote, "I decided not to overturn the decision in the tenure case. This action is final."
Sherley has been controversial because he opposes using embryonic stem cells in research, believing it takes human life; he works with adult stem cells only. He circulated his own e-mail yesterday, responding to the provost's.
"Racism is enabled and fostered by secret procedures; and tenure evaluation is one of the most cloaked processes in the
Institute," he wrote, vowing to proceed with his hunger strike outside the offices of Reif and President Susan Hockfield.
Reif said he has extended Sherley's appointment through June 30 to give him time to "move forward with his career," and he described plans to create a "committee of leaders" to explore how race affects minority faculty members at MIT. Sherley was one of 28 black professors at MIT at the time of the tenure decision.
Read the e-mails below:
From: "L. Rafael Reif"
Date: January 29, 2007 8:00:27 AM EST
To: "MIT Faculty"
Subject: Message to the MIT Faculty
Dear Faculty Colleagues,
Many of you have asked me about the published reports that our
colleague, James L. Sherley, has expressed strong opposition to the decisions and processes regarding his tenure case. He believes that race was a factor in the decision not to grant him tenure. We consider charges of this nature with the utmost seriousness. Issues of fairness and the integrity of our academic processes are matters
of fundamental concern to the Institute.
The policies and procedures for MIT's faculty mandate that the substance of tenure evaluations and deliberations be kept confidential to assure the integrity of the process and to respect individual privacy. As a result, I may not disclose or discuss the substance of the deliberations of Professor Sherley's tenure case. However, I will note that three important faculty reviews occurred between January 2005, when Professor Sherley was notified of the decision not to advance his tenure case, and December 2006, when I notified Professor Sherley that I am not going to overturn the tenure decision:
1. At the request of former Provost Robert Brown, a senior member of the faculty carried out a fact-finding review to answer questions raised by Professor Sherley relating to his tenure case. Professor Sherley agreed with the selection of the faculty member to act as fact finder and provided the specific questions to be addressed. Subsequent to the report of the faculty fact-finder, Professor Sherley filed a formal internal grievance.
2. Early in my service as provost, I asked an ad hoc committee of senior faculty members to address issues Professor Sherley raised in his grievance, including allegations of racial discrimination and conflict of interest. Professor Sherley agreed with the initial selection of the Committee members and was provided the opportunity to review and modify the charge to the Committee. Based on the Committee's detailed report of its investigation and its findings
regarding the adequacy and fairness of the tenure process in
Professor Sherley's case, I advised Professor Sherley that the original tenure decision would stand. Subsequently, Professor Sherley appealed this decision to President Hockfield and advanced additional information that he had not previously brought forward.
3. Because of the seriousness of this matter, the decision was made
to go back to the Committee and to ask them to review Professor
Sherley's additional information. Professor Sherley was given the
opportunity to review and comment on what was sent to the Committee.
The Committee produced a detailed addendum to its original report.
Again, the Committee found that the process in Professor Sherley's
tenure case was adequate and fair. Based on this addendum and the
original report, I decided not to overturn the decision in the tenure
case. This action is final.
I have recently extended the appointment of Professor Sherley through
June 30, 2007. I expect that this time will allow Professor Sherley
and the Institute to develop transition plans that provide for the
continuity of effort and the well being of his research group and for
Professor Sherley to move forward with his career.
Since becoming Provost, and more intensely in the past several months, I have had conversations with many members of MIT's faculty to talk about how race affects the recruitment, retention, and experiences of under-represented minority faculty members at MIT. President Hockfield and I are deeply committed to removing barriers that may exist for under-represented minority faculty members and to examining and assessing effects that race may play in the hiring, advancementand experience of under-represented minority faculty. As a first step, and using the study of the status of women in science as a
guide, we will work with the minority faculty and others to establish
a committee of leaders, and provide them with the necessary resources,
to undertake a comprehensive, rigorous and systematic study of these
issues. President Hockfield and I look forward to reaching out to, and working with, the entire MIT community in these efforts.
Sincerely,
L. Rafael Reif
Sherley's response:
Subject: Open Letter From James L. Sherley: A second plea for help to end racism at MIT
Dear faculty, staff, students and friends at MIT and abroad:
This open letter has a number of purposes. First, I wish to thank those of you who have offered, so graciously, your support, your counsel, your encouragement, your activism, and in some cases your genuine reservations for the protest path that I started on December 19, 2007. Your concerned engagement has lifted my spirit and my hope that change can come, that the grip of racism on American life can one day not only be loosened, but also eventually eliminated completely.
A second purpose is to share with all that, thus far, MIT's upper administration has not addressed my protest demands. Therefore, I continue with the plan for the next phase of my protest. Unless MIT's upper administration addresses these demands, I will begin a hunger strike at 9 AM on the morning of Monday February 5, 2007 outside of the offices of President Susan Hockfield and Provost Rafael Reif, Room 208 in Building 3 on MIT's campus. I will protest in person every morning in this location for as long my health allows it. Thereafter, I will continue my hunger strike even if I am unable to stand in person at the door of 3-208. I am hopeful that I will not have to stand alone and, when I am no longer able, that some among you will rise to stand in my stead. Racism must end at MIT.
Some of you may be aware that mine is not the first voice to call attention to entrenched racism at MIT. In September 1986, hardly a generation ago, then Dean of Student Affairs, Shirley M. McBay, chaired the Minority Student Issues Group that issued a report on "The Racial Climate on the MIT Campus." This report received
national recognition, but cold resistance from MIT's upper
administration. In the preface of the report, Dean McBay wrote,
"MIT must think anew about its policies and procedures for dealing
with racism and racist behavior on its campus. It must reaffirm its
intent to provide a supportive and non-hostile environment for all
who study, live, and work here."
Dean McBay's clarion words still apply today, twenty years later.
The question must be asked whether changes in the degree of racial discrimination at MIT over the past twenty years reflect anything more than national trends. Has MIT led in redressing racism, or has it only reluctantly followed the limited pluralist changes in the greater American society? It is noteworthy that the McBay report did not consider racist practices in tenure promotion at MIT. MIT has not evaluated the role that racism plays in its abysmal record for tenured minority faculty. Instead, MIT takes the racist approach of throwing up the hands and shrugging the shoulders with the convenient excuse that there is a pipeline problem, when the actual barrier is racism that obstructs the end of the pipeline, a pipeline that is full of invisible tragic stories of racial discrimination. Racism is enabled and fostered by secret procedures; and tenure evaluation is one of the most cloaked processes in the Institute.
I discovered racism in my own tenure promotion case at MIT; but I am determined to shine a big bright searchlight on the racially-motivated human tragedy of career destruction and death in MIT's minority faculty pipeline. I protest not only for myself, but also for the many who were persecuted before and the many who might otherwise bear the injury of racism in the future. In ten years, when my daughters are attending universities like MIT, I want to see change. I want to see talented, hardworking minority faculty filling
the ranks of tenured faculty based on their brilliance and industry,
not still absent because of the capricious whims of faculty and high-level administrators who are motivated by racist ideologies.
Statement of Protest Demands
On January 24, 2007, Provost Reif changed his plan to terminate my appointment on January 31, 2007. He extended it to June
30, 2007. However, he stated in his letter, "This extension provides ample time to develop and implement a transition from MIT that allows you to continue to advance your professional career and provides an appropriate transition for those who currently work in your lab."
Thus, he continues to obstruct my right to a fair and just hearing of
my complaint that my tenure case was unfairly decided because of racial discrimination, conflict of interest, and improper actions on
the part of members of the MIT faculty and the MIT Corporation.
The explanation for Provost Reif's persistent preemptory attitude that I should leave MIT before receiving a fair investigation will expose a rotten spot of racism in MIT's internal institutional policies regarding the hire and tenure evaluation of minority faculty. I hope that the honest and just among you will seek an explanation. The complaint itself delineates the racist practices of members of the BE faculty, in particular its head Professor Douglas Lauffenburger.
At my request, I met with Associate Provost Claude Canizares and my MIT advocate, Prof. Kenneth Manning, on the afternoon of January 24, 2007 to share my protest demands and their basis. These demands are:
1. Professor Sherley must receive an immediate grant of tenure as an
admission that his tenure case was unfairly reviewed and decided and
that his formal complaint against the negative decision was unfairly
handled.
2. MIT must acknowledge the racism discovered in Professor Sherley's
treatment as a faculty member in Biological Engineering (BE) on the
part of Provost Robert Brown, Professor Douglas Lauffenburger the head of BE, and other identifiable faculty members (e.g., Professor
Steven Tannenbaum). MIT must acknowledge that Professor Sherley's
experience is not an isolated one. MIT must announce an immediate
commitment of resources, faculty effort, and administration effort to
develop new effective policies for eliminating racism at MIT, with
special attention to institutional and individual racist practices
that constitute unfair barriers to recruitment and tenure of minority
faculty.
3. MIT must obtain the resignation of Provost Rafael Reif because of
his demonstrated obstruction of the formal grievance proceeding that
addressed Professor Sherley's complaint.
Statement of Merit for Tenure
A third purpose of this open letter is to address a question
that some are asking.
"Exactly what has Professor Sherley done to merit tenure at MIT?"
I have established an internationally recognized research program focused on the investigation of adult stem cell asymmetric self-renewal. Asymmetric self-renewal is the signature property of adult stem cells. At the time of Prof. Douglas Lauffenburger's decision to withhold my tenure case from review by Engineering Council, I had 8 invitations for international university seminars and professional meeting plenary presentations. Since that time, the number of international invitations has increased to 14, including a research presentation at the Vatican in Rome. In addition, I have contributed original chapters to two books with international editors and authors.
I have led groups of talented undergraduates, graduate students, post-doctoral fellows, and research scientists in a research program that discovered the first known molecular and biochemical pathways that control adult stem cell asymmetric self-renewal. Our work identified the quintessential cancer gene, p53, as a key regulator of adult stem cell function. At MIT, this foundation of new knowledge was used to address the most challenging problems in stem cell biology. These problems are expanding adult stem cells in culture, discovering markers for their exclusive detection, and investigating their molecular function. In 2003, my group published the first-ever rational method for routine expansion of adult stem cells in culture. In addition, in 2002, we published the first-ever direct demonstration of the validity of a profound adult stem cell hypothesis that had not yielded to other laboratories for more than 25 years. The report of our accomplishment and method induced a flourish of new scientific studies on this topic.
At the time of Prof. Douglas Lauffenburger's negative decision, my MIT faculty personnel record (FPR) listed 45 major publications, 36 as a principal investigator, and 26 at MIT. (I spent the first 6 years of my principal investigator career at the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia.) There were 95 invited seminars and conference plenary talks, 93 as a principal investigator, 61 at MIT, 5 for industry, and 8 international. There were 12 patent applications and technology disclosures, 11 at MIT, and 1 licensed. Twenty news articles had appeared in scientific journals, university newspapers, and general newspapers noting the impact of my group's research. My program was funded with $747,000 per year in direct costs.
Despite the distractions and personnel contraction of the past two years spent pursuing a fair investigation of my complaint, my group has continued to be productive. My current FPR lists 62 major publications, 53 as a principal investigator, 43 at MIT. There are 119 total seminars and conference plenary talks, 117 as a principal investigator, 85 at MIT. There are now 18 patents and technology disclosures, 17 at MIT, 1 licensed. Our program is funded with $1.2 million per year in direct costs.
These achievements put my research program in a unique position to identify exclusive markers for adult stem cells, enable applications for new cellular therapies, and continue our research to elucidate unique properties of adult stem cells. They have also lead to significant scientific and service awards. To my knowledge, I am one of only 4 professors at MIT who have received the Pew Scholars Program in the Biomedical Sciences Award. The other scholars are Professors James Dicarlo, Paul Matsudaira, and Earl K. Miller. I am the only MIT professor who has been inducted into the Pew Science and
Society Institute as a member of the first entering class. I am one
of 5 professors at MIT who are recipients of the Ellison Medical
Foundation Senior Scholar Award in Aging Research. The other scholars are Professors Robert Weinberg, Leonard Guarente, Susan
Linquist, and Robert Horvitz. I am one of two recipients at MIT of
the NIH Director's Pioneer Award, a $2.5 million award for innovative
research. I am also one of two MIT recipients of the Spectrum Trailblazer Award; and I am a 2005 recipient of MIT's Martin Luther King, Jr. Leadership Award.
Evidence of Provost Rafael Reif's Obstruction of the Tenure Decision
Complaint
In my previous two open letters, I have spoken to Provost Reif's action to obstruct my complaint of an unfair negative decision by Prof. Douglas Lauffenburger based on racism, conflict of interest, and the impact of the improper action of Susan Whitehead, a lifetime
member of the MIT Corporation and the chair of the BE Visiting Committee. In addition, the failure of Provost Robert Brown to disclose his close personal relationship with Professor Lauffenburger
and his spouse Professor Linda Griffith completely invalidated the
investigation of my complaint before Provost Reif took over. However, Provost Reif's adjudication is also devoid of integrity. Provost Reif's own words written in his final decision letter sent to me on December 22, 2006 clearly demonstrate his obstruction of my complaint.
What shall we say about a Provost who responded in the following manner to the charge that the BE faculty provided an advisory tenure vote to the head of BE, Prof. Douglas Lauffenburger, when they were not themselves familiar with the tenure case?
"4. The Committee found that neither BE nor any other departments with which the Committee was familiar had or enforced a policy that
required senior faculty to read all materials in a tenure case before
the meeting to consider that case, so that if your materials were not
read by all senior faculty in BE before the meeting on your case, you
were not treated differently in any material sense from others
considered for tenure."
What shall we say about a Provost who responded in the following manner to the charge that Prof. Douglas Lauffenburger repeatedly hid the fact that I was the first appointment in the new Division of Bioengineering and Environmental Health (BEH), which later changed its name to BE? My appointment letter signed by Provost Robert Brown on July 1, 1998 states "Division of Bioengineering and Environmental Health," but Provost Reif wrote, "3. While you feel that you should have been acknowledged as the first faculty member hired in BE, the Committee found that you were in fact hired in the Toxicology division, prior to the formation of BE."
What shall we say about a Provost who responded in the following manner to a charge that a conflict of interest existed that prevented me from obtaining a fair evaluation of my case for tenure? "1. The additional findings of the Committee did not change their earlier conclusion that the evidence does not support your allegations that conflicts of interest adversely affected the consideration of your tenure case.
2. The Committee found that it was appropriate for Professor
Lauffenburger to solicit an internal reference letter from Professor
Griffith, given the overlap in your research areas and the fact that
you had not asked that she be excluded from the list of referees."
Such juxtaposition of ideas is incomprehensible, except as a frank
obstruction of the complaint. To their credit, it appears that the
investigation committee considered the conflict of interest complaint, despite the Provost's earlier instruction that they should
not.
Another inconsistent juxtaposition occurs between Provost Reif's first negative decision letter, sent to me on January 23, 2006, and the currently discussed one from December 22, 2006. On January 23, 2006 he wrote:
"The Committee pursued the question and learned that, after Professor
Lauffenburger reached his decision not to bring your case to Engineering Council, he asked both the Dean and another department head in the School to review your case to advise him whether or not
they agreed with his decision, and they both said they did. The Committee reported that obtaining such confirmatory opinions has been
done in other cases in the past, as well."
The chair of the investigation committee, Professor Steven Lerman,
told my MIT advocate, Professor Kenneth Manning, that the "another
department head" was Professor Wesley Harris, who is African American
and chair of the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
Professor Harris had acted as my confidential tenure advisor for
several years, and I continued to consult with him for a short time
after Professor Lauffenburger's negative decision. To others, he has
denied playing this role in Prof. Lauffenburger's negative decision.
It is also important to note that Prof. Lauffenburger did not use
this decision process for the tenure cases of two white faculty
members who he evaluated for tenure at the same time.
In Provost Reif's December 22 final notice, he writes:
"11. The Committee confirmed that Professor Harris did not see the
tenure case for you that was presented to the BE faculty."
However, he does not say that Professor Lauffenburger did not consult
with Professor Harris for a confirmatory opinion. Surely, this
glaring contradiction in the Provost's own words indicates a lack of
integrity in the grievance investigation. An explanation for this
contradiction must be demanded. In addition, the chair of the
investigation committee, Prof. Steven Lerman, now refuses to discuss
this important matter.
What shall we say about a Provost who continues to pervert my
complaint of inadequate independent lab space to one of lesser lab
space that other junior faculty? The fact that I have been allotted
only 355 sq. ft. of independent lab space, despite repeated requests
for adequate independent lab space to Prof. Lauffenburger, is prima
facie evidence of racist MIT policies for the hire of minority
faculty and racist practices by individuals who administer resources
to minority faculty. Every laboratory scientist knows the crucial
importance of independent laboratory space. Yet, for my entire 8
years at MIT, I have been abandoned to face alone the many
prohibitions on my research program because of sharing space with
senior faculty who were forced to provide their own space by the
racist actions of Provost Robert Brown. Provost Reif wrote only one
obtuse statement regarding my complaint about the quality of the
research space I was provided by Professor Lauffenburger.
"10. While the Committee's first review had determined you were not
provided less funding or space than nonminority junior faculty, they
considered the additional information you presented concerning BPEC
grants, support for the Dupont Alliance, and space, and found no
basis to change their earlier conclusion."
Finally, what shall we in the MIT community and abroad say about a Provost who wrote the following response to the charge of racism in MIT's tenure promotion process, but decided to ignore the importance of the report that provoked it?
"12. Although one personal opinion differed, the Committee found
strong evidence that racial prejudice did not affect the evaluations
of your tenure case among the BE faculty, and found no evidence (as
opposed to that opinion) to the contrary."
Thus, the Provost chooses to ignore the significance of an
independent report that racism played a role in my tenure review in
BE at MIT. In the McBay report of 1986, MIT learned that the voices
who were willing to accept the risks of speaking out against racism
would be few and suppressed. This important lesson has been
forgotten. I am one who has decided to take up Shirley McBay's
clarion call to end racism at MIT. I hope that you will join me in
the struggle.
Yours sincerely,
James Sherley
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 05:06 PM
January 29, 2007
Children's Hospital Boston will double its space in Lahey Clinic's North Shore center when it's done in 2009, the clinic said today.
Children's opened its outpatient satellite in Peabody in 1994. The new 15,000-square-foot pediatric space is part of Lahey's $50 million addition, which includes a larger emergency department and more room for cancer, cardiology, neuroscience and orthopedic services.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 02:13 PM
January 29, 2007
Paul Levy, president and CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, asks this million-dollar question on his blog.
"Here is your chance to send a message to me, my board, or the community at large," he writes. "I promise, all comments will be included (unless you use bad language!)"
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 01:41 PM
January 29, 2007
Chelsea native and philanthropist Warren Alpert has given Brown Medical School $100 million. The school changed its name to the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University in recognition of its largest gift, Brown announced today.
The money will help finance a new building, a scholarship program, biomedical research, faculty recruitment, two new endowed professorships, and an endowment to promote innovations in medical education.
Alpert is the owner of Warren Equities, which sells fuel and groceries from Xtra Mart service stations and convenience stores.
Warren Alpert
The Warren Alpert Foundation has made multimillion-dollar gifts to Harvard Medical School and Mt. Sinai Hospital. Xtra Mart employees have raised money for Boston Floating Hospital's fund to help families of children with cancer.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 12:46 PM
January 29, 2007
Dr. Jeffrey Levin-Scherz is the new chief medical officer for the 700-physician HealthOne Care System, which includes Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates.
He'll also oversee Dedham Medical Associates, Granite Medical, Southboro Medical Group and South Shore Medical Center.
Levin-Scherz comes from Partners Community Healthcare, where he was CMO for the physician network of Partners Healthcare. He'd previously been vice president and corporate medical director for Tufts Health Plan.
HealthOne's acting CMO Dr. Richard Lopez will continue as deputy medical director.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 12:44 PM
January 29, 2007
Saying they can't wait for traditional research to bear fruit, two groups fighting amyotrophic lateral sclerosis will on Thursday toast their joint $36 million drug-discovery venture in Cambridge, a project led by people with personal ties to the disease.
The ALS Therapy Development Institute will have its $6 million annual budget matched by the Muscular Dystrophy Association for three years. The institute, founded in 1999, employs 35 people in Kendall Square but plans to hire 10 to 15 more, said institute president Sean A. Scott.
"Families banded together," said Scott, whose mother died of ALS. "Each of us had a relative with the disease. We wondered who was responsible for curing the disease. At the end of the day, nobody."
For the last five years the institute has screened FDA-approved drugs, looking for possible treatments for ALS. It will continue those tests while also searching for new compounds that might make it to Phase 1 clinical trials, CEO James Heywood said.
Better known as Lou Gehrig's disease, ALS is a chronic, progressive neurodegenerative disease that ends in paralysis. There are about 30,000 people with ALS in the United States.
Heywood's brother Stephen of Newton, who died in November, was the subject of a documentary film called "So Much So Fast."
Jamie Heywood was frustrated by the pace of ALS research.
"If we had decided to go to the moon the way we fund biomedical research, we'd have given $50,000 to 100 people and and wondered why we never got off the sidewalk," he said. "I think there's a need for programs that are rigorous and focused."
The institute describes itself as a "nonprofit biotech company" because of its industry-like approach to finding drugs that combat ALS or developing new ones. It appointed former Biogen Idec executive Steve Perrin as its chief scientific officer. Chairman Augie Nieto, for whom the Muscular Dystrophy Association's Augie's Quest is named, has ALS.
"There's a personal connection," Scott said. "The standards and aggressiveness are completely different when the next person taking the drug is a relative. It's not enough to have something published. It's got to work."
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 10:02 AM
January 29, 2007
Drilling into the earth to mine heat could generate enough electricity to replace aging coal-fired and nuclear power plants by 2050, MIT researchers predict.
Biologist E.O. Wilson addresses his new book "The Creation" to a Southern Baptist pastor, pleading to preserve nature from man-made climate change. (If you missed it yesterday, check out how warm winters are costing New England.)
Screening for disease looks goods in groups, but one-on-one, not so good.
Salem's Dr. Wayne Trebbin brings dialysis treatment to Cameroon, where kidney failure is a death sentence.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 06:24 AM
January 29, 2007
Dr. Leslie Gordon of Children's Hospital Boston knows more children who have died of the rare disease progeria than are alive, she tells the Wall Street Journal. One of them is her 10-year-old son. She's helping to launch the first clinical trial of a potential treatment.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 04:41 AM
January 28, 2007
The Nobel scientist with rock star looks got the big brass sound of the UMass-Amherst marching band he asked for at a bash in Worcester Friday night.
Gov. Deval L. Patrick said "You throw a heckuva party" after he strode through the crowd and greeted UMass Medical School's Craig C. Mello, who shared the 2006 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine with Stanford's Andrew Z. Fire. They discovered RNA interference, a way to silence genes that has revolutionized science and holds hope for saving lives.
As the governor took the hand of Mello's Hungarian-born wife, Edit, who was wearing a dusty-rose and black-lace confection, he told her she didn't have to curtsy.
Mello's family was treated like royalty by the 600 people invited by UMass Medical School to a community dinner celebrating the university's first Nobel. The UMass marching band crowded the more than football-field-size DCU Center ballroom and even got the 6-foot-3 Mello, with long black hair curling over the collar of his gray suit and French blue shirt and tie, to climb a chair and conduct them in a fight song. He obliged, fists pumping and arms waving.
Lt. Gov. Timothy P. Murray warned Mello: "He may be a brilliant scientist able to silence genes, but he's not able to silence politicians."
Patrick said he didn't understand all the science of RNAi, but he knew what lupus meant for his late mother and what diabetes and Alzheimer's mean to his wife, Diane's, mother.
"A silent gene causes no suffering," he said. "A silent gene means a cure. For that I thank you and honor you."
Guests included 1990 Nobel laureate Dr. Joseph Murray, the transplant pioneer who found a way to fight rejection, and cancer researcher Dr. Judah Folkman.
Mello urged politicians to restore shrinking government funding for research. The secrets of the genome sequence and RNAi have been unlocked, creating more opportunity and more need for funds to exploit them.
"I may not be able to silence politicians, but it's nice to have politicians who will listen," he said.
Posted by Elizabeth Cooney at 01:13 PM
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