Whether identifying how best to prevent and treat common conditions or determining the impact of different ways to finance and administer health insurance, the Department of Ambulatory Care and Prevention at HMS has long been at the forefront of some of the nation’s most pressing public health issues. Now the department’s title better reflects these objectives, having been renamed in July the Department of Population Medicine (DPM). The department’s governance has also changed. Although Population Medicine remains an appointing department of HMS, its corporate home is the newly created Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute.
The mission of the department, founded in 1993 by HMS and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care (then the Harvard Community Health Plan), remains the same. “Our goal,” said Richard Platt, professor of population medicine and chair of the department, “is to improve the health of individuals through research and teaching that focuses on populations and the systems affecting their care.”
The DPM’s research has informed federal policies regarding prescription drug coverage, for example, and its faculty members have served on state and national policy boards. The DPM has also designed and implemented programs in comparative effectiveness, delivery science, public health surveillance, prevention and healthcare payment systems. Currently, DPM is assisting the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services with major evaluations of the safety of the H1N1 influenza vaccine.
Likewise, the department’s 40 full-time MD and PhD faculty and 80 staff members are bridging the gap between patient care and population health by training others in the science of epidemiology, the tools of decision analysis and information systems, and the conceptual frameworks of ethics and healthcare policy. At HMS, the DPM currently leads Harvard Catalyst’s Community Engagement Core and the first-year course “Clinical Epidemiology and Population Health.”
Such collaborations are key to DPM’s continued success, explained Platt. “The department’s longstanding partnerships, with HMS, Harvard Pilgrim, Atrius Health and state and national health agencies position us very well to contribute an academic perspective to many of the critical healthcare issues our society is confronting,” he said. “I believe we can play an important role in connecting the changes that must occur at both the individual and healthcare system levels to help improve health.”
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