New Faculty Updates

Matthew Provencher, MD, MC, USN, MBA

Commander Matthew T. Provencher, MD, MC, USN, joins us as Chief of Sports Medicine after his time as Professor of Surgery and Orthopaedics at the Uniformed Services University of Health Sciences, Director of Orthopaedic Shoulder, Knee and Sports Surgery, and Co-Director of Research for Orthopaedic Surgery at the Naval Medical Center in San Diego. Dr. Provencher received his undergraduate degree with Distinction (highest honors) in Electrical Engineering from the United States Naval Academy and received a Distinguished Graduate Award from the Secretary of the Navy. He did both his internship and residency at the Naval Medical Center in San Diego and a Shoulder, Knee and Sports Fellowship at Rush University in Chicago. Most recently, he was the Director of Surgical Services for the United States Naval Ship Mercy during its most recent deployment to the Pacific Partnership.

Dr. Provencher has received numerous distinctions for academic excellence including Alpha Omega Alpha, the Distinguished American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine Traveling Fellowship, the American Orthopaedic Association John J. Fahey, MD, Memorial North American Traveling Fellowship and recently completed the prestigious AOA-ABC Traveling Fellowship. This latter distinction is the highest academic honor in orthopaedic surgery and is greatly deserved. There have been three AOA-ABC Traveling Fellows from the MGH: Dr. William Harris, Dr. Harry Rubash, and Dr. David Ring.

AOA-ABC Traveling Fellows

Dr. Provencher is currently Deputy Editor for Arthroscopy: The Journal of Arthroscopic & Related Surgery, and has won numerous awards for his translational and basic research in Shoulder and Sports Medicine. He is on the Editorial Board of Orthopaedics Today and the Journal of Knee Surgery. He has published over 100 papers, numerous book chapters, editorials and non-peer review articles and has been an invited and recognized speaker in the field of Orthopaedic Surgery.

Dr. Provencher is an asset to our profession, a bona fide expert in the area of Shoulder and Sports Medicine, a recognized translational scientist in the field of Orthopaedic Surgery, and a military leader. We look forward to his many contributions in his new role. Please welcome Matt, his wife Melissa, and children Connor, Brody, Caroline and Catherine!

Soldano Ferrone, MD, PhD

Soldano Ferrone, MD, PhD, is a translational tumor immunologist who earned his MD and PhD degrees from the Medical School of the University of Milan Italy in 1964 and 1971, respectively. He received his clinical training in oncology at the Medical School of the University of Milan as well. In 1971 he moved to the Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation in La Jolla, California, where he held a tenured faculty position until 1981 when he moved to Columbia University in New York. During the following years he held senior administrative faculty positions at New York Medical College, Roswell Park Cancer Institute, and the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute. He moved to Massachusetts General Hospital in November of 2012.

His research program is focused on tumor immunology with special emphasis on the development and application of novel combinatorial antibody-based immunotherapeutic strategies for the treatment of malignant diseases. The design of these strategies is guided by the realization that effective immunotherapeutic strategies have to eradicate not only differentiated cancer cells, but also cancer initiating cells and have to counteract the multiple escape mechanisms used by tumor cells to avoid destruction. For the last 40 years, Dr. Ferrone’s research program has been supported by grants from the NIH, American Cancer Society, DOD and various foundations. Dr. Ferrone has co-authored more than 900 papers and has edited 18 books.

Here at the MGH, Dr. Ferrone has established the Monoclonal Antibody & Immunotherapy Laboratory. In collaboration with clinician scientists such as Drs. Joseph Schwab and Cristina Ferrone, he will continue to investigate the role of immunological events in the pathogenesis and clinical course of malignant diseases and use this information to develop novel immunotherapeutic strategies for the treatment of malignant disease. The information derived from studies in the laboratory and in animal models will be translated to a clinical setting, taking advantage of the expertise and infrastructure at the MGH that facilitates the development of translation research. We look forward to working with Dr. Ferrone!

Maureen Dwyer, MD

Maureen Dwyer, PhD, ATC, is a certified licensed Athletic Trainer who earned her PhD from the University of Kentucky in 2009. Dr. Dwyer completed a post-doctoral fellowship in Muscle Mechanics at the University of Kentucky, where she was awarded a grant from the Arthritis Foundation. She then completed a second postdoctoral fellowship in Joint Fluid Mechanics at the Institute of Orthopaedic Research and Education in Houston, Texas. Her research interests and expertise include the design and application of clinical and translational research models to identify mechanistic contributors to the onset and progression of joint disease.

Dr. Dwyer is currently the Director of Research for the Kaplan Joint Center at Newton-Wellesley Hospital. She is involved in implementing the Harris Joint Registry at the Kaplan Joint Center to examine outcomes for patients following joint arthroplasty, as well as the development of collaborative research projects to examine the clinical and mechanical sequelae associated with traumatic joint injury. She is a member of the National Athletic Trainers’ Association (2000) and the American College of Sports Medicine (2010). Welcome Maureen!