Focus: Hidden - Massachusetts

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New research from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) and Boston Children’s Hospital shows that chronic sleep loss increases pain sensitivity. It suggests that chronic pain sufferers can get relief by getting more sleep, or, short of that, taking medications to promote wakefulness such as caffeine. Both approaches performed better than standard analgesics in a rigorous study in mice, described in the May 8, 2017 issue of Nature Medicine.

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The Lewis Institute at Babson College honored two entrepreneurs who have both impacted significant large scale change, thereby influencing institutional and societal mindsets at the 2017 Social Innovator awards. This year’s recipients were Michael Sorrell, President of Paul Quinn College, and Rosanne Haggerty, President and CEO of Community Solutions.

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A targeted drug whose clinical testing was led by Richard Stone, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, has become the first new treatment for newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia (AML) in more than 25 years.

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Mass. Eye and Ear is enhancing the care it brings to adult and pediatric retina patients with a new and innovative vitreoretinal surgical platform, known as the NGENUITY 3D Visualization System.

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This summer, May 30 to August 4, Babson College's San Francisco campus will be offering the Babson San Francisco Summer Catalyst by Belcham. This program gives students and alumni the opportunity to connect, disrupt, and build in San Francisco through a partnership with BelCham, a government independent not-for-profit with the purpose of supporting entrepreneurial excellence in the US.

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At a glance: · New study reveals that blood-brain barrier function relies on the balance between omega-3 fatty acids and other lipids in cells that line blood vessels in the central nervous system. · This lipid make-up keeps the barrier closed by inhibiting the formation of vesicles that shuttle molecules across cells, a process known as transcytosis. · Low levels of vesicles are maintained by the lipid transport protein Mfsd2a. · Disrupting Mfsd2a may be a strategy for opening the blood-brain barrier to deliver drugs into the brain.

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Neuroscientists at Tufts have discovered a new signaling pathway that directly connects the brain’s NMDA and a7nACh receptors – both associated with learning and memory –– which has significance for development of drugs to treat schizophrenia. Astrocytes are the key elements that link the receptors.

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Babson College is pleased to announce that undergraduate students Julianne Carlin ‘17 and Spencer Rivera ‘17 have received Fulbright U.S. Student Program awards for the 2017-2018 academic year from the U.S. Department of State and the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board.

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The Harvard Medical School-based Personal Genetics Education Project (pgEd.org) and the Sanford Program for the Midwest Initiative in Science Exploration (PROMISE) at Sanford Research have teamed to bring the latest developments in genetics into classrooms and communities in Massachusetts and South Dakota.

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Babson College is the No. 1 private business school for return on investment, according to PayScale Inc., the world’s leading provider of on-demand compensation data and software.

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The Distance Education Enrollment Report 2017, conducted by the new Digital Learning Compass organization, reveals the number of higher education students taking at least one distance education course in 2015 now tops six million.

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At a glance: A newly published analysis shows the use of telemedicine to diagnose, treat and counsel rural patients with mental health disorders rose dramatically between 2004 and 2014. The research found strikingly uneven distribution across states, with four states having no telemedicine visits at all. Overall use of telemedicine for mental health care remains quite low, at 1.5 percent, underscoring the need to explore ways to expand access to such critical services.

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Treating donor corneas with a cocktail of molecules prior to transplanting to a host may improve survival of grafts and, thus, outcomes in high-risk corneal transplant patients, according to a new study led by researchers at Massachusetts Eye and Ear.

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This year’s AATS Centennial, the annual meeting of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery, features a presentation from a team of doctors and other medical professionals who have been travelling to Rwanda for the past 10 years as part of a surgical outreach program aimed at treating patients affected by rheumatic heart disease (RHD) and building a foundation for sustainable cardiothoracic care throughout the country.

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The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business International (AACSB), the world’s largest global education network, has recognized Babson College’s Arthur M. Blank Center for Entrepreneurship for its commitment to creating and incubating cutting-edge business innovations and fostering entrepreneurship in the next generation of business leaders. Babson is one of 35 business schools around the globe to earn the Entrepreneurship Spotlight Challenge distinction.

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Public health researchers from Tufts and colleagues conducted a spatial epidemiology study to identify hotspot clusters of hepatitis C infections in Massachusetts. The information may help to make the best use of funding for education, prevention, testing, and treatment.

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Babson College, ranked No. 1 for entrepreneurship since 1995 and a national leader in education return on investment, continues its innovations in affordability by offering all students an accelerated path to obtaining their undergraduate business degree.

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A new study led by Massachusetts Eye and Ear researchers found that oral promethazine, a drug commonly taken to alleviate motion sickness, temporarily worsened vestibular perception thresholds by 31 percent, lowering one’s ability to perceive sensory information about motion, balance and spatial orientation.

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Massachusetts Eye and Ear and Symphony NH have recently begun a new collaboration between the hospital and professional orchestra toward a goal of bringing medically-based music therapy programs to Mass. Eye and Ear patients.

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Babson College, the top-ranked college for entrepreneurship, has named influential Bostonian, entrepreneur, and angel investor David Chang the Director of its Summer Venture Program (SVP)—Babson’s world-renowned 10-week startup accelerator.

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Researchers are still trying to fully understand anomalous aortic origin of a coronary artery (AAOCA) and its relationship to adverse health outcomes in humans, especially children. Using the most up-to-date literature, as well as the input of leading experts in the field, the American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS) has released practical guidelines for the identification and treatment of AAOCA, including an overview of the latest data surrounding population-based risk.

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MyinTuition has proved so successful that starting this week, a total of 15 schools, including Columbia, Dartmouth, and Rice, are adopting the tool.

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To better manage empyema in the face of rising demand for treatment, the American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS) Guidelines Committee called for the formation of the Empyema Management Guidelines Working Group. The group was tasked with analyzing the latest literature about empyema and issuing new evidence-based clinical guidelines. The resulting Consensus Statement is published in The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery.

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. While there is no cure for atrial fibrillation, many successful treatments are available, including surgical ablation. A growing population of patients means an increased demand for care. In an effort to provide practitioners with the most up-to-date information, the American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS) assembled an expert board to study the available literature and develop evidence-based guidelines and best practices on surgical ablation for the treatment of atrial fibrillation.

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​Babson College announced its 2017 B.E.T.A. (Babson Entrepreneurial Thought & Action®​​​​​​​​​​​​​) Challenge winners—DetraPel, TORq Interface, and botkeeper—after a venture showcase with 18 semifinalists and a pitch competition between nine ultimate finalists.

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Doctors rely mostly on two biomarkers -- urinary albumin to creatinine ratio (ACR) and estimated glomerular filtration rate -- to identify those at higher risk of kidney failure. But researchers say those criteria miss a large proportion of patients who are at high risk of the disease and fail to predict accurately time of onset of ESRD. Researchers from Joslin Diabetes Center have developed a prognostic tool that accurately predicts the risk of end stage renal disease (ESRD) in patients with both type 1 and type 2 diabetes.

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Karen Burns White, Deputy Associate Director of Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center’s (DF/HCC) Initiative to Eliminate Cancer Disparities (IECD) since 2001, has been honored by the Massachusetts Medical Society as the 2017 recipient of the society’s Reducing Health Disparities Award. The honor recognizes an individual who has made outstanding contributions to reducing health disparities due to race, socioeconomic status, age, education, or sexual orientation.

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Dana-Farber Cancer Institute has been recognized as a “Top 100 Great Hospital in America” by Becker's Hospital Review.

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The Global Health Catalyst Cancer Summit is an annual event that provides a forum for global health stakeholders to network, share knowledge and strengthen high-impact international collaborations that save lives while reducing global health disparities. Participants at the GHC Summit come from all across North America, Europe, Africa, and other impacted nations. Participants include leaders from the World Health Organization, World Bank Group, policy makers, Diaspora organizations, community leaders, U.S. congressional representatives, internationally recognized physicians and researchers, industry, professional sports celebrities and other cancer advocates.

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For the fifth time in five years, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute has been recognized as a leader in LGBTQ Healthcare Equity by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) Foundation. The distinction is achieved through evaluation by the Healthcare Equality Index (HEI), an annual survey that measures inclusive policies and practices related to LGBT patients, visitors, and staff at nearly 600 medical facilities nationwide.

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Babson College, No. 1 in entrepren­eurship education for the 24th consecutive year, has launched a new advertising campaign that will dominate the entire 4th and King Caltrain San Francisco Station throughout the month of April.

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How best to treat IMR is controversial, in part, because of the fragility and complexity of the patients, difficulty of grading IMR, the variety of medical and surgical options, and lack of long-term quality studies. Noting that other guidelines generally do not focus on optimal surgical approaches to IMR, the AATS enlisted a group of experts to create a consensus document to provide clinicians with their recommendations based on their opinions and the best available evidence.

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Thomas Cunnington MBA ’63 , Partner, Cunnington & Cunnington and Former Chief Executive Officer, Ward Williston Oil Co., and Laurie Cunnington, Partner, Cunnington & Cunnington and Former President, Ward Williston Oil Co. will be inducted into The Babson College Alumni Entrepreneur Hall of Fame on April 13, 2017. The Hall of Fame celebrates Babson alumni who have distinguished themselves in entrepreneurial endeavors across all types of enterprises, and recognizes each for their accomplishments in creating economic and social value.

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At a glance: People who suffer heart attacks and cardiac arrests in the vicinity of major marathons are more likely to die within a month. The bleaker survival odds are linked to delays in transportation to nearby hospitals. The delays are believed to stem from widespread road closures within the radius of the race. The study findings underscore the need for citywide strategies that ensure rapid transport for medical emergencies in the vicinity of major public events.

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A patchwork of state laws can make it confusing to navigate incapacitated patients’ medical wishes. Without clear national standards, the problem may worsen as the nation’s 75 million baby boomers continue to age, according to medical ethics research led by investigators at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, the Mayo Clinic and the University of Chicago’s MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics.

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Babson Strategy Lecturer Peter Cohan has authored Disciplined Growth Strategies: Insights from the Growth Trajectories of Successful and Unsuccessful Companies. The book provides leaders of large and small companies a proven comprehensive framework to think systematically about growth options and to yield practical strategies that produce faster growth.

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HMS launches free online course to educate clinicians, the public

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Diabetes researchers have puzzled for decades about why insulin-producing beta cells in one pancreatic islet often look and behave quite differently than their counterparts in the same islet or in nearby islets. Using newly identified cellular markers of aging, Joslin Diabetes Center scientists now have shown that this diversity may be driven at least in part by differently aged beta cell populations within the pancreas.

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Babson College F.W. Olin Graduate School of Business has launched a Business and Social Innovation Intensity Track for MBA students, focused on developing the mindset, skills, and competencies needed to create economic and social value simultaneously.

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A team led by Massachusetts Eye and Ear researchers has identified a novel therapeutic target for retinal neovascularization, or abnormal blood vessel growth in the retina, a hallmark of advanced diabetic eye disease (proliferative diabetic retinopathy). According to a report published online in Diabetes, the transcription factor RUNX1 was found in abnormal retinal blood vessels, and by inhibiting RUNX1 with a small molecule drug, the researchers achieved a 50 percent reduction of retinopathy in preclinical models.

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At a glance: • Patients with common conditions such as back pain, headache and upper respiratory infections are more likely to get tests and services that are unnecessary or of little diagnostic and therapeutic benefit—so-called low-value care—if they visit hospital-based primary care practices instead of community-based ones. • Practice location, rather than practice ownership, appears to be the driving factor behind the disparity. • Low-value care was particularly common among patients who saw someone other than their primary care physician at a hospital-based primary care practice.

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Babson College, the top-ranked college in the United States for the study of entrepreneurship, and Junior Achievement USA®, the country’s leading organization giving young people the knowledge and skills to own their economic success, have partnered to offer a $20,000 per year merit scholarship for a Junior Achievement USA student selected from applicants to Babson from across the country.

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In awarding her the grant, the National Science Foundation noted that Ashley Carter's work was notable both for its investigation of DNA folding and for her efforts to recruit women into STEM fields.

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Harvard Medical School to host top journalists for educational fellowships

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Dana-Farber Cancer Institute scientists report a number of patients in a small study with RAS-driven lung, ovarian, and thyroid cancers got long-term clinical benefit from a combination of two drugs that targeted molecular pathways controlled by the RAS gene.

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New Dana-Farber study shows patients with platinum resistant ovarian cancer who wouldn’t be expected to respond to a PARP inhibitor had partial shrinkage of their tumor with the addition of a kinase inhibitor.

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Whitehead Institute scientists have identified a gene that could help clinicians discern which patients have aggressive forms of early stage breast cancer, which could prevent hundreds of thousands of women from undergoing unnecessary treatment and save millions of dollars.

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New research suggests that some patients with head and neck cancers can benefit by continuing treatment with an immunotherapy drug after their tumors show signs of enlargement according to investigators at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and other organizations.

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Olin College of Engineering Professor Lynn Andrea Stein, Ph.D., who also serves as special advisor to the provost, was one of only 46 people selected nationally from nominations by college and university presidents or chancellors as a 2017-18 ACE fellow.

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The number of older adults who are self-employed outweighs that of young adults, suggesting that people of 50 years and older still have a significant role to play in economies around the world—this according to a new Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) Special Report on Senior Entrepreneurship.