Division of Pharmacoepidemiology, Brigham and Women’s Hospital

To provide a setting for a wide range of activities related to the use and outcomes of medications, addressed from a variety of interdisciplinary perspectives.

The work of the Division can be divided into three broad categories:

Research mission The Division carries forward the research agenda of the Program for Analysis of Clinical Strategies, initially begun by Dr. Avorn in 1979.

Training mission Division faculty have created a new curriculum stream within the Department of Medicine training program that is designed to present house officers with information on cost-effective prescribing, as well as equip them with the analytic tools necessary to critically read and understand papers in the medical literature which relate drug benefits, risks, and costs. This approach is presently being extended to the Faulkner Hospital, BWH departments other than Medicine, and the Harvard Medical School curriculum.

Improving drug utilization at BWH The Division serves the Hospital's Pharmacy & Therapeutics committee in an advisory capacity in helping to assess drugs proposed for addition to the Hospital formulary, as well as monitoring the appropriateness of use of existing drugs. Educational interventions are then disseminated as needed to improve use of specific targeted agents.