In the early days of medicine, according to Atul Gawande, HMS professor of surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, it was considered an honorable talent to be able to perform surgery in 25 seconds. Before anesthesia or antibiotics, innovation was measured by the speed of a surgical hand, not the skill or technique behind it.
Breakthroughs in anesthesiology and surgery quickly spread throughout the world, despite the lack of speedy communication methods, making it possible for more people to live long and healthy lives, Gawande said. But modern medicine faces challenges today when it comes to innovation. Medical advances have brought research to a place where innovation may no longer mean a new drug, technique or technological advancement, he said, but the ability to bring these developments to life across the world as quickly as possible.
“The Cheesecake Factory takes eight weeks to roll out a new idea,” Gawande said. “In medicine, it takes years.”
Gawande was the keynote speaker for Brigham and Women’s first annual Research Day on Nov. 15, an event highlighting the hospital’s legacy of research and innovation. BWH is observing the 180th anniversary of the founding of the Boston Lying-In and the centennials in 2013 and 2014 of the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital and the Robert Breck Brigham Hospital.
“Patients come for care,” said Jacqueline Slavik, executive director of the BWH Biomedical Research Institute (BRI). “They don’t know much about our research mission.”
To educate and share the research behind every procedure is a cornerstone of the BRI mission, she said.
Slavik and her team decided last spring to create a research event big enough to create buzz across the entire hospital. BRI had done poster sessions in the past to raise awareness of research, and smaller events had been created around faculty and trainees. The BRI team wanted to share this year’s event with the public, donors, industry collaborators and patients, as well as physicians and researchers who work at the hospital.
“The purpose of the day was not just to get the word out, but to get the word in,” explained Slavik.
The conference engaged the public through mini-symposia and posters spread throughout the hospital. Submitted by BWH researchers, the posters highlighted topics from cancer and technology to nursing research and patient safety. Breakout sessions focused on today’s top research priorities, as voted by the BRI leadership team. Multiple hour-long sessions allowed attendees to hear from leading researchers.
Throughout Research Day, visitors filed through the halls of the hospital, exploring posters and dropping into symposia. The day concluded with the announcement of Robert Green, HMS lecturer on genetics at BWH, as the winner of the $100,000 BRIght Futures Prize. Green and his research team are searching for effective and responsible ways to use DNA sequencing technology in newborns to help families understand a child’s genetic risk for developing diseases such as diabetes, heart disease or cancer.
“Often patients don’t see what goes on behind the bedside care,” said Research Day volunteer Kyungah Chung-Benedetti.
