Trauma Service

The Partners Trauma Service, under the leadership of Dr. Mark S. Vrahas, MD, marked its 13th year as a combined Partners service, with notable achievements and service expansions. Dr Malcolm Smith, Chief of the MGH Trauma Service continues his humanitarian efforts, taking care of patients and improving the quality of orthopaedic care in Haiti. Thank you, Malcolm.

We launched the Orthopaedic-Geriatric co-management services at Mass General and at Brigham and Women’s. Geriatric physicians from the Senior Health Services at MGH will take care of elderly patients who are admitted with orthopaedic injuries. The main goal of these services is to provide consistent age-appropriate clinical care on the orthopaedic units and throughout the hospitals for this patient population. Our program has been well-received by patients and staff alike; initial data review shows positive influences on hospital metrics such as length of stay and time from admission to the operating room. I want to welcome and thank our geriatricians, Drs. Joel Bauman and Bernardo Reyes, for helping these programs get off to such a good start. To determine optimal care, our future plans include smoothing the many processes associated with these patients and conducting robust research about important topics such as hospital-acquired delirium and outcomes in patients with non-operative pelvic fractures.

The Trauma Fellowship program continues to attract top talent from recognized residencies in both the United States and Canada. Our 2011-12 fellows, Trevor Owen, MD, and Stéphane Bergeron, MD, came to us from The Oschner Clinic and McGill University, respectively. Dr. Owen will be heading to the International Center for Limb Lengthening to complete a one-month fellowship prior to starting fulltime work as a traumatologist at the Carilion Clinic in Roanoke, VA. Dr. Bergeron has accepted a position affiliated with McGill University in his hometown of Montreal. He will begin in September after he begins paperwork toward a Masters of Public Health degree at the Harvard School of Public Health this summer.

The Trauma Service Fellowship program has added quarterly journal clubs, feature lectures and cadaveric labs run by experts in the subject area. We look forward to continuing this important educational endeavor and extending it to all our fellowships in the Department.

Dr. Vrahas is working with the Harris Orthopaedic Lab and using radiostereometric analysis (RSA) to assess fracture healing and bone union. While RSA was developed to analyze joint replacements, this study is among the first of its kind using RSA technology in fractures. The Trauma Service also hosted the first Harvard Orthopaedic Trauma Research Day, with presentations by trauma faculty, fellows, colleagues from the orthopaedic labs, and residents. The event was a great success.