Paul G. Rogers Society Ambassadors Carole Mitnick, ScD, and Patricia Hibberd, MD, PhD, hosted congressional delegations at Harvard Medical School and travelled to a congressional district office in Massachusetts to talk about how the research they are doing abroad improves the local economy, and advances health domestically.
Research!America staff Jennifer Chow and Kimberly Handler and Rogers Society Ambassadors Pat Hibberd and Carole Mitnick met with Dr. Mitnick's Representative Barney Frank's staff, Special Assistant John Hollander, at the Congressman's Newton District Office.
The Ambassadors met with:
- Representative Barney Frank's (D-MA) Special Assistant, Jonathan Hollander at Rep. Frank's Newton district office (10/1/09).
- Representative Ed Markey's (D-MA) Congressional and Health Aide, Patrick Lally at Harvard Medical School (10/1/09).
- Senator John Kerry's (D-MA) Senior Healthcare and Policy Advisor, Stephen Meunier at Harvard Medical School (10/2/09).
A renowned expert in childhood pneumonia and diarrhea, Dr. Hibberd is Director of the Center for Global Health Research at Tufts University and a physician-scientist at Tufts Hospital in Massachusetts where she cares for patients with H1N1, some of whom will contract and die from pneumonia. Dr. Hibberd's experience abroad helps her to quickly and accurately diagnose and treat patients here in the U.S.
Dr. Hibberd shares that "while 95% of pneumonia cases are viral, we prescribe antibiotics to everyone. This behavior builds resistance to the antibiotics we have and reduces their effectiveness. We need fast and simple diagnostic tools to diagnose people immediately - this will decrease costs and inefficiencies in our health system, lessening the amount of unnecessary tests and side effects from misdiagnoses. In the US, the delay caused by waiting for information about serious bacterial infections costs an estimated $37 million a year for unnecessary hospitalizations and antibiotics. Advances in global health research will help not only to make more life-saving tools a reality, but will ultimately help us reduce costs at home as well."
A world class expert in tuberculosis and Assistant Professor of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard University, Ambassador Mitnick works with patients who have multi and extensively drug resistant TB, and understands the dangers of antibiotic resistance and a "one size fits all" approach for TB. She researches effective practices to bring health services to compromised people through community health workers in Peru and Haiti and is using that research to reduce costs and improve care in Massachusetts' communities.
Research!America staff and Rogers Society Ambassadors met with Stephen Meunier, Senior Healthcare and Policy Advisor for Senator John Kerry, at the Harvard Medical School.