BWH Celebrates Osher Clinical Center Dedication

Dozens of integrative and complementary care research and clinical pioneers and some of their most generous supporters gathered at Brigham and Women’s Ambulatory Care Center at Chestnut Hill in May to celebrate the dedication of BWH’s Osher Clinical Center for Complementary and Integrative Medical Therapies.

“Today truly is exciting in that we celebrate a dream realized, acknowledge our dedicated clinical team and thank our generous supporters without whose help this would not be possible,” said David Eisenberg, MD, director of Integrative Medicine Programs at BWH and the Bernard Osher Associate Professor of Medicine at HMS.

The BWH Osher Clinical Center offers patients access to a full array of complementary and integrative care from a team of credentialed acupuncturists, chiropractors and massage therapists along with care providers from Medicine, Psychiatry, Nutrition, Physical Therapy and consultations from orthopedics, rheumatology and other conventional specialties. The center also serves as a research incubator through which coordinated access to complementary and integrative care can be evaluated for efficacy, safety and mechanisms of action.

During the May 14 dedication event, Eisenberg thanked Barney and Barbro Osher, the California philanthropists whose $5 million gift funded this unique model of integrative care. In addition, Eisenberg thanked Jack Connors, chairman of Partners Board of Trustees, for traveling to California to bring together the Oshers with BWH and HMS.

“It’s a very simple story of mutual respect and trust among people who believe in one another,” Connors said. “The leadership at BWH and HMS and the Oshers made the commitment to this dream.”

After touring the clinical space with its 12 integrative care exam and treatment rooms, conference room and soothing waiting area, Barney Osher said, “Congratulations on this fantastic, fantastic facility.”

Osher called this state-of-the-art clinical center at 850 Boylston St. “an important step” in bringing integrative care in line with mainstream care. “Bringing all these modalities together here and evaluating them in a hospital like BWH is an important step in gaining acceptance from the insurance companies. Integrative care and traditional medicine belong together, of this I have no doubt.”

Since it opened last summer, BWH’s Osher Clinical Center for Complementary and Integrative Medical Therapies has fit very well into BWH’s spectrum of patient services. More than 600 patients have received treatment from Osher Center clinicians, with 45 percent of those patients seeing at least two care providers. And BWH physicians have made 40 percent of the referrals.

“This is a natural fit with the Fish Center, Pain Center and Spine Center all here in Brigham and Women’s Ambulatory Care Center at Chestnut Hill,” BWH President Gary Gottlieb, MD, said. “Fundamentally, this is aligned with our mission in the commitment to exploring new methods for healing, putting our patients at the center of the care team and teaching providers how best to use a full continuum of care.”