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Victor Dzau, MD,
Chief, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and
members of the DSMHI organizing committee.
Poverty, racism, gender inequality and violence lead to profoundly unequal
distribution of pathologies and inequalities in access to medical care.
Although laboratory research has produced advances in modern medicine,
these advances have benefited just a small percentage of the world's
population. In the U.S., racial and class disparities pose significant
public health problems. Health disparities are far greater in poor countries
where infectious disease and violence remain leading causes of premature
death. At the same time, health policies serve as important determinants
of access to quality care and of differential disease burden.
The newly created Division of Social Medicine and Health Inequalities
is a collaborative effort of the Department of Social Medicine and the
Brigham and Women's Hospital. The Division of Social Medicine and Health
Inequalities seeks to bring insights from the social sciences relevant
to medicine to an academic medical center and thereby improve medical
care. Medical anthropology, history, sociology, epidemiology, statistics
and economics will inform the Division's work.
The primary activity of the Division of Social Medicine and Health Inequalities
will be directed toward fostering and coordinating efforts in training,
research and service, to reduce disparities in disease burden and to
improve treatment outcomes both at home and abroad. The program will
focus on infections such as HIV and tuberculosis, and non- infectious
disease, including coronary artery disease, diabetes and addiction,
as well as other problems of major import to society and of interest
to Brigham and Women's Hospital researchers and trainees.
The Division of Social Medicine and Health Inequalities will seek to
respond to the growing interest among medical students and recent graduates
in health disparities research as well as to their commitment to underserved
populations. The Division will place trainees in ongoing health disparities
research efforts and foster collaborations between trainees and faculty,
including extramural faculty.
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