Program in Biomedical Informatics
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2.
BMI at Harvard, MIT
and affiliated institutions
2.1
History
Harvard and MIT, together with their affiliated hospitals and other institutions, are home to a number of well-known BMI research and development groups. Two of these came into existence in the 1960s (Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Laboratory of Computer Science, which continues to be active, and Beth Israel Hospital (BIH) Center for Clinical Computing). Two groups arose in the 1970s-80s (MIT Clinical Decision Making Group, and Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) Decision Systems Group, both continuing to be active). The 1990s and early part of the first decade of 2000 have seen a number of other informatics groups arise, and at the same time informatics has become an important component of a growing range of other R&D activities. While work in the early years in BMI groups typically focused primarily on clinical and health care information systems and clinical decision support, the range of problems, methods, and approaches has considerably broadened since then, both in the long-standing laboratories and in more recently established ones.
Although we focus on the Harvard-MIT environment and their affiliates particularly, there has been a long history of collaborations and other interactions of the informatics groups in these institutions with colleagues associated with Tufts, Boston University (BU) and their medical centers, which continue to this day. In addition, several of the affiliated hospitals are the homes of information systems technology departments that have built innovative, highly effective operational health care information systems. Collaborations and relationships between the information technology departments and the BMI R&D groups has led to important improvements in health care systems that have had widespread impact. Examples have been the development of MUMPS, COSTAR, the Beth Israel Hospital information system, Paperchase, the Brigham Integrated Computing System (BICS), computerized physician order entry (as part of BICS), error reduction cost-effectiveness demonstrations, and many others.
As a result of the above, the Boston area is unique in its concentration and breadth of faculty involved in the various aspects of BMI.
2.2
Research and
development groups and programs
The following is a
list of R&D groups and information technology (IT) operational units at
Harvard, MIT, and affiliates that are active in informatics, together with
other groups that have major informatics components in their activities. The list is necessarily incomplete, as the
pervasiveness of informatics activities is increasingly widespread.
2.2.1
Primary BMI R&D
groups
*
BWH Decision Systems Group (DSG),
directed by Robert A. Greenes, M.D., Ph.D.
*
MGH Laboratory of Computer Science (LCS), co-directed by G. Octo Barnett,
M.D., and Henry Chueh, M.D., M.S.
* CHMC Childrens Hospital Informatics Program (CHIP), directed by Isaac S. Kohane, M.D., Ph.D.
*
MIT
Clinical Decision Making Group (CDMG), in the Department
of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), MIT, directed by Peter
Szolovits, Ph.D.
* Harvard Medical School (HMS) Lipper Center for Computational Genetics, directed by George Church, Ph.D.
*
BWH
Bioinformatics Core, directed by Richard Maas, M.D., Ph.D
*
HST Laboratory of Leonid Mirny, Ph.D.
*
MIT Bioinformatics and
Metabolic Engineering Laboratory, directed by Gregory Stephanopoulos, Ph.D.
*
Whitehead Institute Center for
Genome Research, directed by Eric Lander, Ph.D.
2.2.2
Institution-based IT
units with significant development/evaluation components
* HMS Deans Office, Educational Technology Division, directed by John Halamka, M.D., M.S.
* Partners Information Systems, directed by John Glaser, Ph.D.
* CareGroup Information Systems (CIS), directed by John Halamka, M.D., M.S.
* CHMC Information Systems CHIS), directed by Daniel Nigrin, M.D., M.S.
2.2.3
Other institutional
entities with informatics development/evaluation components
* HMS Countway Library, directed by Judith Messerle, M.L.S.
* Partners HealthCare Center for Quality Analysis, directed by David Bates, M.D.
*
Harvard Clinical Research Institute
*
Partners Center for Healthcare Technology
Leadership
2.2.4
Research centers with
informatics components
* The Harvard-Partners Center for Human Genetics and Genomics (HPCGG), directed by Raju Kucherlapati, Ph.D.
* HSPH Health Decision Science (HDS), in the Departments of Biostatistics and Health Policy & Management (HP&M), directed by Milton C. Weinstein, Ph.D.
*
BWH Surgical Planning Laboratory,
directed by Ron Kikinis, M.D.
* HST-MGH Martinos Center, directed by Bruce Rosen, M.D.
*
Partners
HealthCare-MIT-Draper Laboratory Center
for Integration of Medicine & Innovative Technology (CIMIT), directed
by John A. Parrish, M.D.
2.2.5
Other Harvard and MIT
informatics groups with biomedical interests
*
MIT Laboratory for Computer
Science
*
MIT Laboratory of Eric Grimson,
Ph.D.
*
MIT Laboratory of Forbes Dewey,
Ph.D.
2.2.6
Other Boston-area BMI
groups that collaborate with Harvard-MIT groups
*
NEMC Division of Clinical Decision
Making, Informatics and Telemedicine, directed by Stephen G. Pauker, M.D., training program
co-director John Wong, M.D.
*
BU Medical
Information Systems Unit, directed
by Robert Friedman, M.D.