Tufts CTSI Blue Star Program Graduates Inaugural Class

Congratulations to the inaugural cohort of the Blue Star Investigator Certificate Program. On November 17, 11 clinicians from across Tufts Medical Center completed this eight-week program designed to develop junior investigators’ skills in the nuts and bolts of designing and running a clinical trial. Departments represented by the learners included: anesthesiology, endocrinology, hematology/oncology, Mother Infant … Continued

Stakeholder Expert Panel and PI Karen Freund Discuss Insurance Stability and Reform

Tufts Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) Stakeholder Expert Panel (SEP) members met recently with Karen Freund, MD, MPH to chat about her recent publication, Racial Differences in Insurance Stability After Health Insurance Reform (Med Care. 2019 Apr;57(4):256-261). The discussion included six SEP members and was moderated by Robert Sege, MD, PhD, Tufts CTSI’s Lead … Continued

Tufts CTSI Partners with MassBioEd to Give Boston Kids ACCESS to Life Sciences Education

What do scientists do, and how do they do it? The Massachusetts Biotechnology Education Foundation (MassBioEd) helps underrepresented minority middle- and high-school students answer this question through its Aligned Curricular & Career Experiences for Secondary Science Program (ACCESS) at Match Charter Public School in Boston. Tufts Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) has pledged to … Continued

Research Results: Stakeholder Conversation with PI Carolyn Rubin

On May 6, members of Tufts CTSI’s Stakeholder Expert Panel launched Research Results: Stakeholder Conversations, a series of discussions with Principal Investigators (PIs) about their published research. Panel members review journal articles written by researchers affiliated with Tufts CTSI, select the studies most interesting and applicable to them, and then invite the PIs to talk about their … Continued

Tufts Pediatrician Collaborates to Address Barriers in Autism Diagnoses within Chinese Immigrant Communities

From language barriers to differences in cultural norms, it can be challenging for members of minority communities to access proper health care. A specific area of difficulty lies in diagnosing children with autism. Developmental-Behavioral Pediatrician Christina Sakai, MD, along with Pediatric Psychologist Christina Mulé, PhD, set out to address the impact of Chinese culture on diagnosing … Continued

Helping the Quest for Nutrition Come to Fruition at OASIS on Ballou

For Apolo Cátala, community engagement is a way of life. As Farm Manager of Codman Square Neighborhood Development Corporation (NDC)’s OASIS on Ballou, he is committed to engaging people in healthy, affordable nutrition through urban agriculture. “Our mission is to create food access in a multi-dimensional way by encouraging people to make a better connection … Continued

Tufts CTSI Scholar Collaborates with MIT to Further Obstetrics Research

Alissa Dangel, MD, is hoping to change the way pre-term breech babies are delivered. After working for nearly a decade as an attending physician in Obstetrics and Gynecology at Tufts Medical Center, she is now pursuing her interest in research as a TL1 Clinical Research Fellow in Tufts CTSI’s Clinical and Translational Science Graduate Program. … Continued

TL1 Postdoctoral Fellow is a Researcher on the Rise

Alison Brown, PhD, MS is a researcher on the rise. In May 2017, immediately after earning her PhD in Food Policy and Applied Nutrition from the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, she enrolled in Tufts CTSI’s Clinical and Translational Science Graduate Program as a certificate student and a Tufts CTSI TL1 Postdoctoral Fellow, working with … Continued

Asian Health Symposium Addresses the Impact of Stress in Immigrant Communities

Community leaders, researchers, clinicians, students, and neighborhood residents gathered in Boston’s Chinatown neighborhood on April 6 to talk about stress. The 4th Annual Asian Health Symposium, In Pursuit of Health and Wellness: Addressing the Impact of Stress in Asian Immigrant Communities was presented by Tufts CTSI and local community partner organizations. All are members of Addressing Disparities in Asian Populations through Translational Research (ADAPT).

Focusing on Collective Impact to Improve Asian Health

More than 90 community leaders, researchers, clinicians, students, and neighborhood residents gathered in Boston’s Chinatown neighborhood on December 6 to talk about working together to improve Asian health. The 3rd Annual Asian Health Symposium: From Collecting Data to Collective Impact was presented by Tufts CTSI and local community organizations. All are members of Addressing Disparities … Continued

Working Together to Address Research Barriers

Since the inception of Tufts CTSI, we have worked to break down silos within and across our institutions, build relationships, and develop a sense of common purpose across the research enterprise. In June 2015, our Comparative Effectiveness Research (CER) signature program, led by John Wong, MD (Director) and Thomas W. Concannon, PhD (Associate Director), made … Continued

Developing Better Treatments for Animals and Humans

Can a dog with a knee injury help to inform the treatment of a person with an Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) tear? Veterinarians and physicians using the One Health approach to translational research think so. One Health, a signature program at Tufts CTSI led by Director Lisa Freeman, DVM, PhD, DACVN, acknowledges the importance of the evolutionary and ecological links between … Continued

Baystate Medical Center Scientists Launch Community-Engaged Research Study

Sarah Goff, MD and her team at Baystate Medical Center recently received a Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) award for Project ACCCES: A Collaboration to develop Capacity for Community-Engaged Research in Springfield. This project seeks to build a coalition of stakeholders and investigators who will be prepared to examine health inequities faced by at-risk populations … Continued

Accelerating Research through IRB Reliance

What’s the key to speeding the process of discovery and development of solutions that improve human health? One critical element is multi-site collaboration to quickly enroll subjects into clinical research studies; however, the traditional Institutional Review Board (IRB) review process to establish these studies can be complex and time-consuming. Harvard Catalyst (the Harvard Clinical and Translational Science Center), in partnership with Tufts CTSI, … Continued

Improving Pediatric Health Through Patient & Family Engagement

“Comparative effectiveness research and patient/family engagement are changing health care,” says Dr. Leyenaar. “We’re giving families a real voice to express their priorities and preferences, and this generates new knowledge about patients who may benefit most from particular treatments or processes.”

Improving Outcomes for Patients with COPD

When Mihaela Stefan, MD, MS first came to Baystate Medical Center in 2005 as a physician, conducting research was not part of her plan. Eight years later, she is a PhD candidate in the Clinical and Translational Science Program at the Tufts Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences and the 2013 recipient of the prestigious Lasagna … Continued

Helping Patients Make Informed Choices About Arthritis

More than 10 million Americans suffer from knee osteoarthritis (OA), the most common cause of disability in the United States. While there is currently no cure for knee OA, there are a variety of treatment options, including acetaminophen, NSAIDs, and steroids. Which interventions work best? Raveendhara Bannuru, MD, a PhD student in the Clinical and … Continued

Tufts Researchers Find Vitamin D May Be Associated with Diabetes

What if you could decrease the risk of diabetes by taking a vitamin? With the incidence of diabetes on the rise, such a low-cost intervention will have an important impact on public health. Researchers at Tufts University and Tufts Medical Center have been studying the relationship between vitamin D and type 2 diabetes for several … Continued

Building Healthier Communities Through Collaboration

Connecting researchers and community members to improve the public’s health is a primary focus at Tufts Clinical and Translational Science Institute (Tufts CTSI), and Aligning Researchers and Communities for Health (ARCH) specializes in fostering those conversations. In November 2012, the Tufts CTSI ARCH team partnered with Harvard Catalyst (the Harvard Clinical and Translational Science Center), … Continued

Chance Encounters, Strong Collaborations

Scientific collaboration can be the product of a chance encounter. Two people meet, find they have something in common—research interests, health policy views—and decide to work together. Take, for example, the simple beginning of the ongoing collaboration between Tufts CTSI and the Museum of Science. Peggy Newell, Vice Provost of Tufts University, was talking at … Continued

Empowering Immigrant Domestic Violence Survivors through CBPR

Program Manager Sujata Ghosh MSc, MSW, and her research team at the Asian Task Force Against Domestic Violence (ATASK) in Boston’s Chinatown neighborhood had never participated in a research fellowship program. That was until they were notified of their acceptance in 2011 into Tufts CTSI’s Building Your Capacity (BYC): Advancing Research through Community Engagement Program (PDF). … Continued

Transparency: Does it Improve the Value of Our Hospital Care?

Comparison shopping has long been a trusted buyer’s strategy in this country. Who amongst us wouldn’t pay less for something if we could get it cheaper? But, can the same be said for medical care? During the past decade, the public’s desire to know about hospital performance and pricing has resulted in an increasingly vocal … Continued

Understanding Your Capacity: Utilizing Community Resources to Maximize Research Scope

Designing an innovative research project isn’t just about building your resources; it’s also about understanding and maximizing the resources you already have. Rachael Bowers, LICSW, a pediatric social worker at the Dimock Center in Roxbury, MA, can certainly attest to this. Her participation in Tufts CTSI’s Building Your Capacity (BYC): Advancing Research Through Community Engagement … Continued