Welcome to Benchmarks, your semi-weekly dose of research news and notes from the Mass General research community. With 9,500 people working across more than 30 departments, centers and institutes, there’s more research news at Mass General than we can get to each week. Here are a few highlights:

In this Issue:

• Research in the News
• Studying Surgically Removed Nerve Cells to Learn More About the Roots of Chronic Pain
• Study Shows Meds Rarely Initiated After Discharge for Alcohol Use Disorder
• Tweets of the Week
• This Week in MGH History
• Mass General-Trained Nurse Performs Life or Death Operation with Improvised Tools
• Hyperthyroidism Can Be Successfully Treated Radioactive Iodine, Mass General Doctor Reports

Research in the News

Studying Surgically Removed Nerve Cells to Learn More About the Roots of Chronic Pain

Kyle Eberlin, MD, a physician-investigator in the Department of Surgery at Mass General, is part of a pioneering effort to find the origins of one of humanity’s most intractable afflictions: chronic pain.

The Boston Globe reports that Eberlin is part of a team of Boston-based doctors using novel technology that peers inside individual cells and catalogs every component, enabling the researchers to identify the features associated with pain.

And while previous pain research has relied on animals, this team has found ways to study human tissue — by collecting, with patients’ permission, nerve cells removed in surgeries and from autopsies. Read more.

Study Shows Meds Rarely Initiated After Discharge for Alcohol Use Disorder

Patients hospitalized for alcohol use disorder (AUD) rarely initiate medications for AUD (MAUD) after discharge, according to a research letter published online June 27 in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

Eden Bernstein, MD, from Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and colleagues characterized MAUD treatment initiation after AUD hospitalizations using a sample of Medicare Parts A, B, and D beneficiaries with continuous enrollment 12 months before and after cohort entry. A total of 28,601 AUD hospitalizations representing 20,401 unique patients were included in the cohort.

Overall, 206 and 364 patients initiated MAUD treatment within two and 30 days of discharge, respectively (0.7 and 1.3 percent). Of patients with a primary discharge diagnosis of AUD, 2.3 percent initiated MAUD treatment within two days of discharge.

“Our findings highlight missed opportunities for MAUD treatment initiation among the high-risk group of patients with AUD who are hospitalized,” the authors write. Read more.

Tweets of the Week

This Week in MGH History

Mass General-Trained Nurse Performs Life or Death Operation with Improvised Tools

July 5, 1919 (The Cambridge Chronicle) – With a razor, a spool of cotton thread and a small portion of ether and chloroform Miss Marla P. Kouroyen, an American Red Cross nurse, recently performed a life-or-death operation in Macedonia—the success of which has contributed to her being known as the “the American angel” by the homeless and starving Greek refugees.

Kouroyen, who trained at Massachusetts General Hospital, used a razor, a small supply of ether and cotton thread as an improvised amputation kit to help a Greek solider whose legs had been crushed. Despite the prophecy of a local doctor that the patient would not live through the night, Kouroyen sometime later received a visit from the recovering soldier, who was now using an artificial leg that was manufactured for him by the American Red Cross.

Hyperthyroidism Can Be Successfully Treated Radioactive Iodine, Mass General Doctor Reports

July 7, 1946 (New York Times) – Earle M. Chapman, MD, of Massachusetts General Hospital told the American Medical Association last week how radioactive iodine can be administered effectively to patients suffering from hyperthyroidism or overactive goiter—a chronic disease which in its extreme form (exophthalmic goiter) is characterized by bulging eyes, rapid heart action and nervous irritability.

In the past, exophthalmic goiter could be cured only by surgery. Now, according to Dr. Chapman, a patient can be cured by giving radioactive iodine by mouth at a cost of about $2.50.

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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