• Saving lives, one blood donor at a time
  From comforting patients and educating families to performing emergency procedures and saving lives, MGH employees help patients and their families in so many ways without fanfare or high praise. Some MGHers, however, were given special recognition Dec. 9 at the MGH Blood Donor Center Employee Appreciation Luncheon in the Wellman Conference Room for going above and beyond the call of duty for patients.
  

• New director of Cardiovascular Research Center named
  The MGH announced this week that Kenneth R. Chien, MD, PhD, will be joining the hospital next year as the new director of the Cardiovascular Research Center (CVRC). As a prominent physician-scientist from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), Chien will lead the hospital's cardiovascular research efforts.

• New Baby Safe Haven Law: How the MGH is responding
  This past summer, Gov. Mitt Romney signed into law the Baby Safe Haven legislation that is intended to provide a safe alternative for parents who decide they cannot take care of a newborn baby and might otherwise abandon the child. The law requires all hospitals — acute care, inpatient rehabilitation and long-term acute care — as well as police departments and fire stations to act as a designated facility where parents may voluntarily abandon their newborn babies — 7 days old or younger — without fear of criminal prosecution. The law was put into effect Oct. 29.

• Women's health research database gets connected
  The Women's Health Coordinating Council (WHCC) has launched a new website that will help clinicians find research related to the care of women at the MGH. Located at http://is.partners.org/mghintranet/whcc/index.htm, the site features a database to search for
  clinical studies that include women as part of the study population; relate to health issues experienced by women throughout their lifespan; or address specific health concerns
  of women.
  

• Study will identify lung cancer patients for Iressa treatment
  Earlier this year, MGH researchers announced their discovery of a genetic marker that could
  predict which lung cancers would respond to treatment with the targeted-therapy drug Iressa (gefitinib). Now the same team has launched a study using this marker to identify at the outset patients most likely to respond to the drug.
  

• Poignant grand rounds about ALS
  Scott Mackler, MD, PhD, from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, visited the MGH Dec. 9 and delivered a compelling joint presentation about ALS — amyotrophic lateral sclerosis — at Neurology Grand Rounds with Merit Cudkowicz, MD, of MGH Neurology.

• Everybody wins with CalStat
  The next in the series of CalStat posters, which features some the winning units from the first and second quarters of the MGH Hand Hygiene Clean Sweepstakes, soon will be distributed throughout the hospital.
  

• What's Happening

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