By This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it | Corridor Inc. Staff Writer

Originally published February 2007

Research technologist Paulette Gonzalez tests patient samples at the Penn Medical Lab at Washington Hospital Center in Washington, D.C. Photo by Marilyn DiMarco

    

     The office is a nerve center, linking an array of studies and trials taking place at the institute’s laboratories. Research is ongoing at its three main labs, two at Washington Hospital Center — which includes an animal testing facility — and one at Union Memorial Hospital, and at any of the in-hospital facilities used for clinical trials.

     The institute is the research hub for MedStar Health, the Columbia-headquartered community healthcare organization with seven major hospitals and various outpatient facilities in the Baltimore-Washington area.

     Since 1963, the institute has been breaking ground on some of the most recognized research in the country, often by taking advantage of the racial and socioeconomic diversity in the Baltimore-Washington Corridor.

     MedStar’s research interests run the gamut, from oncology to neuroscience to obesity. At Washington Hospital Center, faculty administers a heart failure program that recently received a $1.8 million grant from the National Institutes of Health for continuing stem cell research. MedStar has also established an oncology research network with 7,000 new cancer patients a year.

     There is a heavy focus on conducting research that targets traditionally underrepresented groups — like African Americans and Hispanics — who are generally not part of clinical studies, said Barbara V. Howard, the former president of the institute.

     The institute also conducts field studies across the country involving American Indians, Alaskan Eskimos and Native Hawaiians.

     “Diverse populations are our specialty,” said Howard, who stepped down last month after 16 years as president.

     That forward thinking has helped the institute grow tenfold since 1991.

     Today, with 440 employees, the institute has 1,000 studies with human subjects and 320 funded projects going, said Howard.

     MedStar is also among the top 20 percent of all institutions in the country in terms of total funding received from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Bethesda-based federal agency tasked with conducting and supporting medical research.

     Including diverse populations in studies is required at NIH, said Dr. Vivian Pinn, director of the Office of Research on Women’s Health at the agency.

     “If a treatment is created, we must make sure all [populations] are benefiting,” she said of the importance of including minorities in clinical trials.

     The diverse data MedStar collects “is widely used for two reasons,” said Howard. “The data is important for the care providers of those populations, and what you’ve learned forms a model system that is applicable all over.”

     She’s quick to point out that while race can play a physiological role, access to care and health insurance are more likely the reason why certain ethnic groups are at higher risk for disease.

     “It’s more complex than access, it’s about education,” she added, noting the institute holds classes and workshops for the community when it can.

     That’s important, said Dr. Neil J. Weissman, the institute’s interim president, who was most recently vice president of research programs.

     “We can take new information and take it from bench to bedside to the community,” he said.

     The MedStar community includes plenty of federal agencies. In fiscal year 2006, the institute received 55 federal contracts and grants, totaling $24 million, or 60 percent of its total funding. These included agreements with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the National Eye Institute, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and the U.S. Army.

     Funding and access are just some of the perks of being neighbors to so many federal resources, said Howard.

     The institute receives the other 40 percent of its funding, roughly $16 million, from private foundation and for-profit partners, she added.

     Regardless of where the funds come from, the outcomes from MedStar studies are directly applied all over, Howard added.

     “There remains a disconnect between what the academic Ivy League towers are doing and what’s happening in the community,” Weissman added. “We are the real world — we have the ability to say this worked well in the community hospital.” <