The Involved Patient- Clinical & Research News - For and about the Physicians and Researchers of Brigham and Women's HospitalThe Involved Patient- Clinical & Research News - For and about the Physicians and Researchers of Brigham and Women's Hospital

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The Involved Patient

Lewis Presents MFCDA Medical Grand Rounds

This year's MFCDA recipients Alejandro Diaz (at left) and Robert Riviello pose with Eldrin Lewis (center), grand rounds presenter and former award recipient.

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Care for the patients, involving the patients. This theme of patient-centered care was at the core of the Minority Faculty Career Development Award (MFCDA) grand rounds, a special Department of Medicine grand rounds and BluePrint event hosted by the BWH Center for Faculty Development and Diversity’s Office for Multicultural Faculty Careers (OMC).

The presentation, titled “Management of the Advanced Heart Failure Patient: A Balancing Act Between Quality and Quantity of Life,” was given by 1996 MFCDA recipient Eldrin Lewis, MD, MPH, of the BWH Division of Cardiovascular Medicine, and followed by an honorees’ breakfast in the Shapiro Cardiovascular Center.

Lewis was one of BWH’s two inaugural recipients of the award. The MFCDA program celebrates 15 years of providing financial support to early-career underrepresented minority clinicians at BWH, with the goal of increasing the presence of underrepresented minority faculty across the institution. During the presentation, Lewis stressed the need for clinicians and care staff to integrate the patient perspective into the clinical decision-making process when caring for those with severe heart failure.

“We need to realize that caring for patients is a process and not an event,” said Lewis to attendees in Bornstein Amphitheater.

Drawing attention to patient-centered outcomes studies and poignant examples from his own clinical experience and research, Lewis suggested that the future of clinical decision-making processes for severe heart failure patients go beyond test results. The process should focus on patients’ quality-of-life, blending conversations with patients and their families about their needs and wishes with early referral for advanced therapies.

During grand rounds, the 2013 MFCDA recipients - Alejandro Diaz, MD, MPH, of the BWH Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care, and Robert Riviello, MD, MPH, of the BWH Division of Trauma, Burns and Surgical Critical Care - were presented with certificates by Joseph Loscalzo, MD, PhD, chair of the BWH Department of Medicine, and Barbara Bierer, MD, director of the BWH Center for Faculty Development & Diversity. Diaz and Riviello are the 26th and 27th recipients of the award.

“One of the wonderful things about being an MFCDA recipient is that even before you are welcomed into the family, you are already family,” said Bierer. “Some of the recipients have gone on to take leadership roles at other institutions, but like family, they always return home.”