Image: Dylan Parsons, Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard, Dylan Parsons Photography

COVID-19 has shown us it’s possible to dramatically reduce the timeline for translating new research findings into patient care.

Can Mass General researchers pivot just as rapidly to address challenges in health equity and population health?

That was a key topic of discussion during the 72nd Annual Celebration of Science and meeting of the Scientific Advisory Committee (SAC) earlier this month.

The two-day event was organized by the Executive Committee on Research (ECOR) of the Mass General Research Institute.

Day 1: Poster Session, ECOR Report, Awards and Presentations

Day one began with an online poster session featuring 233 abstracts from researchers across Mass General. Twenty-four finalists were selected to give short presentations on their research and 12 winners were named.

ECOR Chair David Fisher, MD, PhD, kicked off the afternoon by acknowledging the contributions of Mass General president Peter L. Slavin, MD, who had announced his plans to step down earlier that day.

The 270% growth of research operations at Mass General during the past two decades—from $250M in 2000 to $1.013B in 2020—is part of Dr. Slavin’s legacy, Fisher said. “He has been an extraordinary champion of research.”

The afternoon concluded with four scientific presentations—two each from the 2020 Howard M. Goodman Fellowship recipients (Benjamin Kleinstiver, PhD, and Caroline Sokol, MD, PhD) and the Martin Prize winners for the best publications in clinical research (Sabrina Paganoni, MD, PhD) and fundamental research (Martin Aryee, PhD).

Day 2: COVID-19 Innovation, Health Disparities and Research Opportunities

The morning of day two was dedicated to COVID-19, health equity and developing the next generation of population and health care delivery team scientists.

“Operation Warp Speed has shown how fast we can do work that used to take years and decades,” said Mongan Institute director Stephen Bartels, MD, MS, who served as moderator. “Can we take what we’ve learned in the past year and continue moving forward with rapid translational science?”

Presentations by Mongan investigators touched on COVID-19 in group living situations; social and ethnic barriers to clinical trial participation; global inequity in vaccine distribution; and a grassroots campaign to vaccinate elderly residents in Chelsea, East Boston and Lower Roxbury.

Katrina Armstrong, MD, chief of Medicine, discussed the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on junior investigators.

While these up-and-coming investigators are crucial to maintaining the research pipeline, they’ve been hit hard by lab shutdowns, the stopping of study visits, hiring freezes and the prioritization of clinical care, Armstrong said.

The Department of Medicine has implemented programs to help, but more needs to be done at the national level, such as increasing the flexibility and amount of support for training and career development awards, extending or supplementing current grants and expanding loan repayment programs, she said.

Aswita Tan-McGrory, MBA, MSPH, and Long Nguyen, MD, MS, presented on the COVID Corps Program, which was established last summer to provide graduate and undergraduate students with paid, COVID-19 related research internships.

Individuals from groups typically underrepresented in the sciences were encouraged to apply.

Of the 22 interns in the 2020 cohort, 16 were female, non-binary, questioning or transgender; 18 were first-generation university students, 13 were immigrants or new Americans; eight were Black or African American, four were Hispanic and nine were Asian.

“A really welcome byproduct of this pandemic is how these interns invited us [virtually] into their homes,” Nguyen said. “Countless parents, aunts, uncles, siblings were pulled into the Zoom frame to express their gratitude and how much this opportunity meant to their entire family.”

Day 2 concluded with a panel discussion on COVID-19 innovation moderated by Galit Alter, PhD, who gave a keynote presentation on COVID-19 innovations from the lab bench to the globe.

Gary Tearney, MD, PhD, shared what the Mass General Brigham COVID Innovation Center has done to increase the supply of personal protective equipment for health care workers. A. John Iafrate, PhD, talked about the initial challenges of ramping up COVID-19 testing at the hospital and establishing a hospital-wide testing policy.

Richelle Charles, MD, discussed her research into COVID immunology, and Ricky Mofson, DO, detailed the challenges of standing up a large-scale vaccine trial in the midst of a pandemic.

Alter said her interactions with the media office over the course of the pandemic has highlighted the importance of science communication and outreach.

“It is important to put our heads down, look at the petri dishes and pipettes, and make sure we’re answering those questions that are going to advance the vaccines as quickly as possible,” she said.

“But it is just as important to have those outward facing conversations with the patients, individuals and communities we need to engage.”

About the Mass General Research Institute
Research at Massachusetts General Hospital is interwoven through more than 30 different departments, centers and institutes. Our research includes fundamental, lab-based science; clinical trials to test new drugs, devices and diagnostic tools; and community and population-based research to improve health outcomes across populations and eliminate disparities in care.
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