Past Events
2024
Health Equity Innovation Pilot: Using Race in Research
January 16, 2024 – Dr. Valerie Stone presented on best practices for using race in research.
2023
Health Equity Innovation Pilot: Overview of IRB Process
December 20, 2023 – Hiromi Martorano, PhD, Assistant Director of Expedited Review, provided an overview of the IRB process, including the different types of applications, exploring the research navigator website, and utilizing different tools/templates.
DOM Diversity Council Quarterly Meeting
December 19, 2023 – At this meeting, the DOM Diversity Council discussed the results of our fellowship match for AY24-25, which yielded approximately 23% URiM and 49% women. We also reviewed an analysis of historical trends in the retention of our fellows.
URiM Fellows Dinner
December 13, 2023 – Dr. Christopher Estiverne (director) and Dr. Nicolette Rodriguez (co-director) of URIM fellowship initiatives hosted an informal dinner at El Peñol in Brookline to discuss how to navigate being a physician-investigator from fellowship through your early career. The dinner featured three discussants: Maria Pabon Porras, MD – Fellow, Cardiology; Diana Lopez, MD, MSc – Instructor in Medicine, Division of Cardiovascular Medicine; and Ayobami Akenroye, MBChB, MPH, PhD – Assistant Professor of Medicine, Division of Allergy and Clinical Immunology
DOM Health Equity Innovation Pilot Kickoff for FY24 Grantees
November 8, 2023 – This event kicked off our fifth cohort of projects for the Department’s annual Health Equity Innovation Pilot (HEIP) program. At this meeting, each of the five project teams introduced themselves. Our featured speaker was Dr. Mia Chandler, an Attending Physician in the Rheumatology Program at Boston Children’s Hospital and Instructor in Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, who will share a framework on Social Determinants of Health definitions and research framing.
Annual Cookout for URiM Residents, Fellows, and Faculty
September 30, 2023 – Dr. Valerie Stone hosted the fourth annual cookout for the Department of Medicine’s URiM residents, fellows, and faculty at her home with our full DEI leadership team in attendance!
Health Equity Innovation Pilot (HEIP) 2022-23 Projects: Final Reception and Presentations
September 20, 2023 – We hosted final presentations and a reception for the 7 project teams that were part of our 2022-23 cohort for the Health Equity Innovation Pilot (HEIP) grant funding program, which is wrapping up its fourth year. We thank the project teams for all of the wonderful work they have done over the past year using their HEIP funding! The presentations and robust engagement was a fitting way to celebrate and share what each of us learned and accomplished over the past year.
Projects:
- Drs. Jeffrey Schnipper, Amrapali Maitra, Ritika Dutta (presenter), and Sowda Ahmed (presenter), “Decreasing Racial Inequities in the Utilization of Security Emergency Responses in the Hospital”
- Dr. Amirrezza Haghighi, “Evaluating Visual Representation of Skin Tone and Sex in Medical Education and Patient Engagement Materials”
- Sophie Beauparlant (presenter), Andrea Fleurant (presenter), Dr. Rose McKeon Olson (presenter), Dr. Marie Plaisime, Dr. Jeffrey Schnipper, and Dr. Bram Wispelwey, “Enhancing Racial Equity for Medicine Admissions Boarding in the Emergency Department”
- Drs. Colleen Monaghan, Ndang Azang Njaah, Lillian Zerihun (presenter), and Christopher Calahan, “Addressing Hypertension Disparities in the Primary Care Setting”
- Drs. Lisa Rotenstein and Marie McDonnell, and Mary Merriam (presenting), “Diabetes in Control for Hispanics through an Alliance / DIabetes en Control en Hispanos a través de una Alianza.”
- (not presented). Drs. Maureen Achebe and Lauren Merz, “Impact of Duffy Status on Chemotherapy Administration Among Black Women with Breast Cancer”
- (not presented). Drs. Navin Kumar and Jean Padilla Aponte, “Improving the Quality of Colon Cancer Screening for our Spanish-Speaking Patient Population.”
URIM Fellows Dinner
August 3, 2023 – Dr. Christopher Estiverne (director) and Dr. Nicolette Rodriguez (co-director) of URIM fellowship initiatives hosted a group of URiM fellows at the Punch Bowl in Brookline as part of our community building activities.
New Women Faculty Mentoring Circles: Final Event
July 12, 2023 – Dr. Ellen Seely led a wonderful program on Optimizing Your Professional Network as the final event in our inaugural New Women Faculty Mentoring Circles program. The broader program included 4 circles organized by theme: clinical responsibilities, teaching, and work-life balance; research for non-clinician researchers; and research for physician-scientists. We would like to thank the faculty who joined us at the final event and participated in activities throughout the year. Special thanks to our circle co-leaders: Drs. Valerie Stone, Stephanie Mueller, Elisabeth Battinelli, Tamar Sofer, Kathryn Rexrode, Dawn DeMeo, Ellen Seely, and Ingrid Katz.
Juneteenth Celebration: URiM Intern Welcome
June 17 2023 – We were delighted to welcome our newest class of URiM interns, who joined us on Monday, June 19th! This event for all URiM residents was hosted at the Franklin Park Zoo to celebrate Juneteenth, which marks the effective end of slavery in the United States in 1865 and is a holiday that celebrates Black communities’ rights to freedom.
Intern Orientation Week: Community Justice Equity in Medicine Orientation
June 13, 2023 – The Community, Justice, and Equity in Medicine (CJEM) Orientation brought together all of our incoming interns to learn more about our patients’ communities; where our patients may seek care outside of the Brigham; and community organizations/resources supporting social determinants of health. Our full-day agenda included:
- Welcome Address & Overview of the Day: Drs. Luisa Paredes and Helen Knight, DEI Chief Medical Residents; Dr. Margee Louisias, Assistant Program Director for Racial Justice and Health Equity; and Dr. Morgan Esperance, Associate Director for the Leadership for Health Equity Pathway
- Our Patients Our Clients Recruitment: Dr. Sarah Zambrano, PGY-3, Leadership for Health Equity Pathway
- Keynote Address: Dr. Valerie Stone, Vice Chair for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, Department of Medicine
- Mobilizing Communities Panel: Moderated by RonAsia Rouse, Interim Director, Community Health and Health Equity – Community Engagement, BWH Center for Community Health and Health Equity. Panelists: Ariel Childs, Executive Director, Vital Cxns; Dianne Wilkerson, Co-Founder, Black Boston COVID-19 Coalition; Gladys Vega, Executive Director, La Colaborativa; and LaShyra “Lash” Nolen, Executive Director, We Got Us
- The Impact of Population Trauma on Health: What Medicine Does Not See: Dr. Karen Abdool, Director of Mental Health & Wellness, New England Medical Association
- Antiracism Workshops: 11 breakout workshops led by faculty, residents, and BWH leaders
Health Equity Innovation Pilot Learning Collaborative: Translating Health Equity Innovation into Advocacy and Policy Change
June 6, 2023 – Open to past and current recipients of grants from our Health Equity Innovation Pilot (HEIP) program as well as our DOM Health Equity Advisory Council, Rachel Landauer and Johnathon Card, two lawyers and health and social justice advocates from the Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation at Harvard Law School (https://chlpi.org/), spoke about strategies to translate the work we do into advocacy and health policy changes.
New URiM Faculty Workshop: Foundation and Industry Funding
May 4, 2023 – The BWH DOM Office for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion hosted a workshop for new underrepresented in medicine (URiM) faculty on applying for and securing foundation and industry. The session discussed the importance of researching prospective sponsors and cultivating relationships with foundation sponsors to identify alignment of interests with funding priorities, doing a cost/benefit analysis of effort spent on applying for an award compared to the funding allocation, and being mindful of conflicts of interest with industry sponsors while also recognizing that industry relationships can offer positive benefits including early access to new therapeutics and technology that can be a source of innovation in a faculty member’s work. The panelists for the session were: Drs. Jose Figueroa and Ishani Ganguli of the Division of General Internal Medicine and Dr. Andrew Aguirre of the Division of Medical Oncology, with Dr. Valerie Stone as moderator.
HEIP Learning Collaborative: Midpoint Presentations
April 25, 2023 – This was the fourth meeting for the 2022-23 Learning Collaborative for the Health Equity Innovation Pilot (HEIP) program. At this meeting, grantees provided brief updates on their HEIP Projects (~5 min each). During their PowerPoint presentations they shared details regarding their progress, any challenges they encountered, and their next steps.
URiM Resident Retreat
April 7, 2023 – This was the 3rd Annual DOM URiM Retreat held at the MIT Endicott House campus in Dedham, MA from 12:30pm to 7:15pm. We began with lunch and mingling which was then followed by the plenary panel titled: “Navigating Work/Life Chaos: Charting Your Unique Journey & Creating a Joyful Life.” The panelists discussed their individual career paths, including successes as well as obstacles, and offered advice to the residents as they presented their questions. The speakers were Enrique Caballero, MD, Chinwe Ukomadu, MD, PhD, and Sarimer Sanchez, MD, MPH. Margee Louisias, MD, MPH served as the moderator for this discussion.
Following this panel we facilitated breakout sessions to discuss career development with a focus on administrative & non-academic careers. Each breakout group included a moderator and two to three panelists. We then transitioned to the speed mentoring portion of the retreat where select URiM Fellows and Faculty were paired with URiM Residents. The goal of this event was to foster connection, honest discussion, and deliver accessible information. Thank you to the URiM Retreat Planning Committee for putting this together!
New URIM Faculty Workshop: Financial Wellness
April 5, 2023 – The DOM Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion hosted a workshop on financial wellness that addressed a number of topics including student loan repayment, supplementing income, investment strategies, and retirement planning. The speakers were Dr. Brittne Halford, Director of Hospital Medicine Quality Improvement at Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital and an Instructor in Medicine at Harvard Medical School (HMS); Dr. Margee Louisias, Assistant Program Director for Racial Justice and Equity for the Internal Medicine Residency and Assistant Professor of Medicine at HMS; and Dr. Valerie Stone, Vice Chair for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the Department of Medicine and Professor of Medicine at HMS.
HEIP Learning Collaborative: Racial Justice Framing
March 2, 2023 – Dennie Butler-Mackay, LICSW and Abigail Ortiz, MSW, MPH facilitated a discussion on Racial Justice framing. Participants received an overview of Critical Race Theory and engaged with examples to consider the ways terminology and framing matter.
New URIM Faculty Workshop: Harvard Medical School Promotions Process: Everything You Need to Know
March 2, 2023 – This was a URiM New and Early Career Faculty event presented by Dr. Valerie Stone, Vice Chair for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the Department of Medicine and Professor of Medicine at HMS, who discussed key features of the HMS faculty promotion process.
Financial Seminar for URiM Fellows and Residents
February 27, 2023 – This was a virtual session providing URiM residents and fellows with an introduction to personal finance. Several items were discussed, including debt management, retirement accounts, key principles of investing, and buying a home. The session was led by Dr. Navin Kumar, a faculty member in the Division of Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and Endoscopy and an Assistant Professor of Medicine at HMS.
New URIM Faculty Workshop: Navigating the Minority Tax
February 2, 2023 – This was the first event in our annual programming for new faculty who are underrepresented in medicine (URiM). This virtual session focused on the minority tax – the burden of additional responsibilities that URiM faculty face in response to efforts to achieve diversity, equity, and inclusion. These responsibilities are often undervalued relative to other endeavors and may limit the ability of URiM faculty to pursue their own career goals and attain their own professional success. Speakers included:
- Cheryl Clark, MD, ScD, Associate Chief for Health Equity and Partnerships, Division of Primary Care and General Internal Medicine and Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
- Nora Osman, MD, Director of Medical Student Education, Department of Medicine and Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
- Fidencio Saldana, MD, MPH, Director of Diversity and Inclusion, Division of Cardiovascular Medicine, Dean of Students, Harvard Medical School, and Assistant Professor of Medicine
- J. Kevin Tucker, MD, Vice President for Education, Mass General Brigham and Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
URiM Fellows Community Building Dinner
January 25, 2023 – We held a community building dinner at Blossom Bar, in Brookline, which gave URiM Fellows in an opportunity to connect in a relaxed atmosphere over food, drinks. They met with the Co-Directors of the Department of Medicine URiM Fellow Initiatives, Chris Estiverne and Nicolette Juliana Rodriguez.
DOM Diversity Council Quarterly Meeting
December 20, 2022 – The DOM Diversity Council held its quarterly meeting on Tuesday, December 20, 2022. At the meeting, we reviewed diversity data for our fellowship programs that recently matched. We were excited to see that 29% of our incoming fellows identify as URiM and 48% as women. In addition, we reviewed data on faculty promotions for FY22, which revealed significant increases in the number of URiM and women faculty promoted over the past year.
HEIP Learning Collaborative: IRB Process and Resources
December 15, 2022 – Hiromi Martorano, Assistant Director of Expedited Review, provided an overview of the IRB process, including the different types of applications, exploring the research navigator website, and utilizing different tools and templates.
Social Media Seminar for URiM Fellows
November 30, 2022 – We hosted Dr. Narjust Florez and Dr. Lachelle Weeks, who gave a talk entitled, “To Tweet or Not to Tweet?”: The Good and Bad of Social Media Use in Academia. As part of their talk, Drs. Florez and Weeks highlighted the ability of social media to promote one’s accomplishments and work, support mentoring relationships and identification of collaborators outside one’s institution, connect with others in a research area or via affinity groups, and share information with patients. They shared a variety of tools and strategies about how to build a social media presence and create a regular pattern of posts.
New Women Faculty Mentorship Circle Launch and Reception
November 16, 2022 – Our New Women Faculty Mentoring Circles had their kickoff reception on Wednesday, November 16, 2022! Mentoring themes include: clinical responsibilities, teaching, and work-life balance; research for non-clinician researchers; and research for physician-scientists. Thank you to our circle co-leaders Drs. Valerie Stone, Stephanie Mueller, Elisabeth Battinelli, Tamar Sofer, Kathryn Rexrode, Dawn DeMeo, Ellen Seely, and Ingrid Katz – as well as to all the faculty who responded!
Kickoff of Health Equity Innovation Pilot (HEIP) Learning Collaborative for 2022-23
November 8, 2022 – We held our kickoff meeting for the 2022-23 Learning Collaborative for the fourth year of projects for our Health Equity Innovation Pilot (HEIP) program. At this meeting, we offered a more formal opportunity for the 8 project teams for this year to introduce themselves and to hear from Dr. Cheryl Clark, Associate Division Chief for Equity Research and Strategic Partnerships in the Division of General Internal Medicine and Primary Care, who will share a framework for health equity research and evaluation efforts.
HEIP Grantee Final Presentations and Reception Event
September 2022 – On September 28, 2022, we hosted final presentations and a reception for the 11 project teams that were part of our 2021-22 cohort for the Health Equity Innovation Pilot (HEIP) grant funding program. We thank the project teams for all of the wonderful work they have done over the past year using their HEIP funding! The presentations and robust engagement was a fitting way to celebrate and share what each of us learned and accomplished over the past year.
Annual URiM Residents, Fellows, and Faculty Cookout Event
September 2022 – On Saturday, September 24, 2022, we hosted our annual cookout for URIM residents, fellows, and faculty at Dr. Valerie Stone’s home.
Juneteenth Celebration Event
June 2022 – We were delighted to welcome our newest class of interns, who joined us on Monday, June 20, 2022! Prior to their start, Dr. Valerie Stone hosted a welcome event at her home on the preceding Saturday for all URiM residents to celebrate Juneteenth, which marks the effective end of slavery in the United States in 1865 and is a holiday that celebrates Black communities’ rights to freedom.
The Who, What, and Where at the Brigham, MGB, HMS, and Boston: Dr. Joseph Loscalzo Shares Insights / Discussion
May 4, 2022 – This event for new and early career URIM faculty featured a dialogue between DOM department chair Dr. Joseph Loscalzo and Dr. Valerie Stone on navigating the institutions that faculty encounter in the Boston area – and the city itself.
URiM Resident Retreat and Faculty and Fellow Reception
March 25, 2022 – The URiM Resident Retreat was held on March 25, 2022, at Suffolk Construction Headquarters. The event began at noon for URiM medicine residents. Fellows and faculty were invited to join the reception that followed the retreat beginning at 4:30pm. The reception featured speaker was Robert S.D. Higgins, M.D., President of Brigham and Women’s Hospital
BWH Internal Medicine Match Day 2022 / Announcement
Note: This was compiled from an email distributed on March 18, 2022, by the DOM Department Chair
Our intern selection season has come to its conclusion and has resulted in a spectacular intern Match! From our incredible list of newly matched interns, almost a quarter also come from diverse backgrounds underrepresented in medicine (URiM). This continues our extraordinary momentum in building a more diverse work environment and residency. We are indebted to Drs. Nnenna Ezeh, Miguel Linares and Ramon Rodriguez, who served as resident co-chairs of our URiM subcommittee that did such great work. In addition, special thanks are due to Drs. Carl Pallais, Margee Louisias, and Valerie Stone, who led the URiM subcommittee and did extraordinary work in helping us enrich the diversity of our community through the Match.
The HMS Promotions Process: Everything You Need to Know / Presentation
February 15, 2022 – Supporting academic advancement has been a cornerstone of our DEI strategy as we seek to improve the representation of URiM faculty in more senior ranks. Dr. Stone hosted this session for new and early career faculty to provide insights into the Harvard Medical School promotion criteria, offer recommendations about how faculty can pursue mentorship and other sources of support to help them meet these criteria, and answer questions about the timing of the promotion process.
First Reception for New and Early Career URiM Faculty / Virtual Reception
January 12, 2022 – We held our first reception for new and early career URIM faculty on January 12, 2022, and it was a success! Thank you to everyone who attended. This reception was a wonderful kick-off to a series of events that will cater to enhancing the experience of our new early career URIM faculty within our community. After introductions, we discussed ideas for future events focused on creating a sense of belonging at BWH and increasing institutional knowledge. Some of the ideas that we are particularly excited about include workshops on academic promotion pathways, employing social media as a career enhancement tool, and social events such as forest bathing – a practice of being present and doing so in nature.
Mental Health Matters / Quarterly DOM Health Equity Forum
December 2021 – This Department of Medicine quarterly Health Equity Forum focused on mental health with a distinct focus on understanding barriers and innovative strategies to achieve equity in mental health care. There were three expert panelists that each shared what was being done at their institution to enhance access to mental health services, particularly for vulnerable and historically underserved communities. The panelists were Justin Chen, MD, MPP, Director of Outpatient Psychiatry at MGH, Samara Grossman, MSW, LICSW from a clinical social worker with Brigham Psychiatry and Ryan Boxill, PhD, MBA, the Chief Behavioral Health Officer at Boston Medical Center. The conversation was facilitated by Hermioni Amonoo, MD, a BWH psychiatrist and researcher.
The discussion provided insight to the work being done across our city to ensure equitable access to mental health support and resources, and innovative strategies for achieving that goal. After the forum, Drs. Valerie Stone and Candace Feldman, the leaders of DOM Health Equity Initiative met with leadership from the Department of Psychiatry to relay key points from the forum and to discuss efforts that are underway at BWH to improve access to mental health care for our patients.
BWH and MassHealth Patients – The Impact of the MGB Medicaid ACO on Health Equity / Quarterly DOM Health Equity Forum
September 2021 – This Department of Medicine quarterly Health Equity Forum brought together a remarkable panel addressing frequent questions related to care of BWH Medicaid patients and the case for the Medicaid ACO payor care mechanism with perspectives ranging from creation of the MGB ACO, to our implementation, to policy trends and future directions in Massachusetts. Medicaid Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) are risk-sharing agreements between state Medicaid programs and providers of healthcare. The model is designed to financially incentivize health systems to make better decisions and improve patient outcomes, yet reduce costs compared to unstructured care systems. In turn, if higher quality Medicaid services are provided at a lower cost, health systems share in the financial savings. Moderated by Dr. Valerie Stone, Vice Chair for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the DOM, the panelists included Dr. Stanley Hochberg, Senior Medical Director, Strategy, Population Health Management, MGB; Jan Lamey, Program Director, Care Innovation, BWPO; La’Toya Bartlett, Program Manager, BWH Primary Care; and Dr. Ryan Schwarz, Director of Policy for Accountable Care, MassHealth.
Racial Equity Impact Analysis Workshop / Quarterly DOM Health Equity Forum
July 2021 – Racism, a system of advantage based on race (d. David T. Wellman), operates in tandem with other forms of oppression to lock in inequities. A Racial Equity Impact Assessment (REIA) is a systematic examination of how seemingly neutral policies and practices perpetuate racism and other unfair systems. At this workshop, facilitated by Dennie Butler-Mackay, L.I.C.S.W., and Abigail Ortiz, Director of Community Health Programs, of Southern Jamaica Plain Health Center, participants learned about REIAs and how they can be used in a variety of contexts, including the analysis of proposed policies, institutional practices, programs, plans, and budgetary decisions. The REIA can be a vital tool for preventing institutional racism and for identifying new paradigm options to remedy long-standing inequities and ensure better outcomes for all.
Removal of the EGFR Multiplier: How Research and Activism Changed Policy and Health Equity / DOM Quarterly Health Equity Forum
May 2021 – The eGFR race-based multiplier, and others like it, are embedded in the electronic medical record (EMR) and embed racism throughout healthcare delivery. This quarterly DOM Health Equity Forum focused on colleagues combined health equity research, political engagement and activism, and contributions on a professional society guideline panel to change health policy and remove this harmful eGFR multiplier at numerous academic medical centers across the country, including BWH and MGH. The leaders of this amazing effort, which started locally and became national, shared this incredible story as an inspiring example of how research can drive institutional change and improve health equity. The panelists included Dr. Nwamaka Eneanya, Assistant Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania; Dr. Michelle Morse, Deputy Commissioner for the Center for Health Equity and Community Wellness, Chief Medical Officer, New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School; Dr. Mallika Mendu, Assistant Professor, BWH Division of Renal Medicine; and Dr. Cameron Nutt, BWH Internal Medicine Resident. Dr. Valerie Stone moderated the session.
MGB United Against Racism: A BWH DOM Conversation / Presentation
February 2021 – In October 2020, MGB President and CEO Anne Klibanski announced a deep commitment to work to eliminate the many impacts that racism has on patients and employees within our own system. The initiative offers MGB’s roadmap for delivering the solutions our patients, our communities, and our staff deserve. The system-wide plan includes specific timelines and metrics of success on our journey to becoming an anti-racist organization. Foci include Leadership, Employees and Culture, Patient Care, and Community Health and Public Advocacy. Dr. Thomas Sequist, Chief Patient Experience & Equity Officer, and Dani Monroe, MGB Vice President and Chief Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Officer are leading this initiative and presented key tenets at this session. Following the presentation, participants engaged in a vigorous discussion considering the implications and impact of this important effort for the DOM and about what needs to shift for the change to be successful.