Category: News

Adil Haider, MD, MPH, has received a National Institutes of Health (NIH) – National Institute on Aging (NIA) grant for his study “Comparative Effectiveness of Trauma Center Care for Older Americans“.

Trauma is a major cause of morbidity and mortality among Americans aged 65 and over. Ensuring older trauma patients receive the optimal level of trauma center care may be one important way to improve outcomes; however, the effectiveness of trauma centers in improving outcomes among older patients remains unclear.

This study will determine the effectiveness of trauma center care among older patients, specifically focusing on differences between traumatic brain injury (expected to benefit from higher-level trauma center care) and hip fracture (manageable regardless of treating facility) while addressing short and long-term outcomes including mortality, complications, readmissions, functional status, hospice enrollment and cumulative direct costs.

 

Adil Haider, MD, MPH
Kessler Director, Center for Surgery and Public Health, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Associate Surgeon, Division of Trauma, Burn, Surgical & Critical Care, Brigham and Women’s Hospital

Adil Haider, MD, MPH, is an active trauma and critical care surgeon, prolific researcher, and the Kessler Director for the Center for Surgery and Public Health (CSPH), a joint initiative of Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He is also the deputy editor of JAMA Surgery and president-elect of the Association for Academic Surgery (AAS).

Dr. Haider is credited with uncovering racial disparities after traumatic injury and establishing the field of trauma disparities research. He is regarded as one of the foremost experts on healthcare inequities in the United States, with projects focused on describing and mitigating unequal outcomes based on sex, race, sexual orientation, ethnicity, age and socioeconomic status. His other research focuses on long-term clinical and functional outcomes after trauma and emergency general surgery, optimal treatment of trauma/critically ill patients in resource-poor settings, and advanced analytic techniques for surgical health services research.

Dr. Haider has formally mentored more than 120 research trainees, published more than 230 peer-reviewed papers and serves as principal investigator on extramural grants worth more than $8M. He believes that equality is the cornerstone of medicine, and his professional goal is to eradicate disparities in healthcare in the United States.

Stephanie Nitzshke, MD, has been named medical director of the Burn Center at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

Stephanie Nitzschke, MD
Associate Surgeon, Division of Trauma, Burn, Surgical & Critical Care, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Medical Director, Burn Center, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Instructor in Surgery, Harvard Medical School

Stephanie Nitzschke, MD, is an acute care surgeon, trauma surgeon and surgical intensivist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and instructor in surgery at Harvard Medical School. She is a graduate of Loyola University Stritch School of Medicine in Maywood, IL and completed a General Surgery Residency at INOVA Fairfax Hospital in Falls Church, VA. Dr. Nitzschke completed a Burn Surgery Fellowship at the U.S. Army Institute of Surgical Research in Fort Sam Houston, TX and a Trauma & Critical Care Fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, PA.

Dr. Nitzschke is an active participant in resident and medical student education. Her research interests include clinical outcomes for burn and trauma patients. She has authored over 15 peer-reviewed manuscripts, chapters and presented 20 abstracts and lectures regionally and nationally concerning surgical care.

Bohdan Pomahac, MD, has been appointed the inaugural Roberta and Stephen R. Weiner Distinguished Chair in Surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

 

Bohdan Pomahac, MD
Roberta and Stephen R. Weiner Distinguished Chair in Surgery, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Director, Plastic Surgery Transplantation, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Professor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School

Bohdan Pomahac, MD, was born and raised in the Czech Republic where he graduated from Palacky University School of Medicine. He trained at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) in General Surgery and completed a fellowship in the Harvard Plastic Surgery Program.

Dr. Pomahac established the Plastic Surgery Transplantation Program at BWH, one of the world’s leading centers in face and vascularized composite tissue allotransplantation (VCA). As a pioneer in the field of VCA transplantation, he led the teams that performed the second partial face transplant and the first three full face transplant procedures in the United Stated. In 2011, the team performed the first successful bilateral upper extremity transplantation in the Northeast. Under Dr. Pomahac’s leadership, the BWH VCA transplant team has performed a number of additional face and hand transplants, and expanded research protocols to include lower extremity and abdominal wall transplantation.

Dr. Pomahac’s research team is currently working on implementation of immunosuppression minimization strategies in clinical trials, development of technology to extend the viability of tissues and other research topics related to VCA transplantation and plastic surgery. His clinical interests include facial reconstruction, reconstruction of oncologic defects including breast, esthetic surgery and microsurgery.