Education

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), a teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School and one of the affiliate medical centers of the Harvard Plastic Surgery Residency Program, is a Level 1 Trauma Center with 585 licensed beds.  BIDMC hosts nearly three quarters of a million patient visits annually in and around Boston.  BIDMC was a 1996 merger of the Beth Israel and Deaconess hospitals.  Both hospitals had a long and distinct history within the Boston and Harvard communities.  The Deaconess Hospital was founded by Methodist Deaconesses in 1896 as part of a missionary charter to care for city residents in Boston.  The BIDMC was established in 1916 by the Boston Jewish community to meet the needs of the growing immigrant population.  The BIDMC has approximately 600 beds. Prior to the establishment of the Harvard Combined Plastic Surgery Residency Program, there was an accredited plastic surgery residency program at the Deaconess Hospital headed by the late Francis G. Wolfort, M.D. Rotations for the residency took place at the Deaconess Hospital, Cambridge Hospital, and at the Beth Israel Hospital, under its Chief of Plastic Surgery, and former editor of the PRS, Robert M. Goldwyn, M.D., who still is actively involved in the residency.

Currently, the Division of Plastic Surgery at the BIDMC is headed by Sumner A. Slavin, M.D.   The Division offers a full-array and varied experience in both reconstructive and aesthetic plastic surgery.  As of July 1, 2007, there will be five full-time faculty plastic surgeons on staff, as well as five senior community plastic surgeons that operate at the medical center.  The hand service, which is also covered by plastic surgery, the residents also work in collaboration with the Orthopedic Hand Faculty and participate in didactics integrating both orthopedic and plastic surgical approaches to treating the upper extremity.

Brigham and Women's Hospital

Brigham and Women’s Hospital, a 747-bed teaching affiliate of Harvard Medical School, is located at 75 Francis Street in the renowned Longwood Medical Area of Boston. It has been ranked on US News and World Report's Honor Roll of America's best hospitals for 11 consecutive years.

While its roots date back to 1832, Brigham and Women’s formed in 1975 with the merger of the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, the Robert Breck Brigham Hospital, and the Boston Hospital for Women.  BWH has over 44000 inpatient admissions per year, utilizing over 700 beds, and an annual research budget of more than $400 million.

Formal plastic surgery training began in Boston in 1967 when the first residency was established by Dr Joseph E. Murray at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital and Children’s Hospital. Dr. Murray received the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1990 for his contributions to organ and cell transplantation.

Dr. Elof Eriksson has been the Chief of the Division of Plastic Surgery at Brigham and Women’s since 1986. His active research focuses on wound healing and gene therapy. Dr. Julian Pribaz is the Director of Hand and Microsurgery and his research involves new methods for customizing and prefabricating flaps. Since 1999 when the separate programs at Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center were combined, he has also been the Program Director for the Harvard Plastic Surgery Residency Training Program. Dr. Dennis Orgill is the Associate Chief at the Brigham & Women’s Hospital and is a busy reconstructive surgeon and directs the BWH Burn Unit while undertaking research in tissue engineering and wound healing. Dr. Charles Hergrueter specializes in pediatric hand surgery as well as other reconstructive problems. Dr. Christian Sampson specializes in hand and microsurgery. Dr. Karl Breuing is the Director of the Wound Center and has a busy reconstructive surgery practice. Dr. Bohdan Pomahac is Associate Director of the BWH Burn Unit and a reconstructive surgeon with active research in these areas. Both graduates of the Harvard Combined Plastic Surgery Program, Dr. Yoon Chun  and  Dr. Lifei Guo recently joined the Division.  Dr. Yoon Chun is a board-certified plastic surgeon specializing in oncologic reconstructive and cosmetic breast surgery.  Dr. Guo specializes in complex reconstructive surgery in head and neck, breast, and extremity.   Dr. Stephanie Caterson, the newest addition to our team, specializes in microsurgical breast reconstruction. 

Children’s Hospital, Boston

Children’s Hospital, Boston (CHB)  is one of the largest pediatric medical centers in the United States.  Founded in 1869 as a 20-bed hospital for children, today it is a 300 bed comprehensive medical center that records approximately 18,000 admissions per year.  Plastic surgery at CHB recently received Department status under the new leadership of Dr. John Meara  in 2006.  The Department provides a wide variety of comprehensive reconstructive services for children with craniofacial anomalies, vascular anomalies, and congenital hand defects. Interdisciplinary teams with excellent ancillary services and physician support provide a great clinical experience for our plastic surgery residents. The cleft lip and palate clinic manages approximately 600 patients per year, and the craniofacial clinic evaluates 250 new patients on a yearly basis. This tremendous volume supports one fellow in craniofacial/pediatric surgery each year at the CHB. Strong consulting services and a busy Level 1 Pediatric Trauma Center provide a wealth of complex reconstructive needs. Residents currently rotate through CHB in the PGY 5 and PGY 6 years.  

Massachusetts General Hospital

The Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), the third oldest general hospital in the United States, was chartered in 1811. With over 800 beds and a 3,500 member medical staff, MGH is the largest of the teaching hospitals affiliated with Harvard Medical School. MGH admits over 35,000 patients annually, and sees over 750,000 patients in the outpatient and emergency department settings. Approximately 25,000 operations are performed by the surgical staff at the MGH each year. The original building of the Massachusetts General Hospital, the Bulfinch Building, houses the historic Ether Dome. While on rotation at the MGH, residents have the opportunity to learn from expert surgeons on the private service, as well as gain independent operating experience on the ward service. Residents also attend a number of weekly educational conferences, including Hand Conference on Tuesday mornings, Grand Rounds on Wednesday mornings, Attending Rounds on Thursday mornings, and Ortho/Plastics Joint Hand Conference on Friday mornings.

Each of the attending staff has one or more ambulatory outpatient clinics at their respective hospitals.  Residents are assigned to attend these clinics and see patients preoperatively with the attending surgeons - discussing the clinical problems, options for management, possible complications, and formulating a treatment plan.  For cosmetic patients, residents also gain experience in financial discussions.   Preoperative photographs of the patients' booked for surgery may be taken by residents and faculty.  The residents also get the opportunity to see exams and follow up postoperative patients that they may have assisted with in surgery and managed postoperatively in the hospital.  They are able to take postoperative photographs and evaluate the results of the treatment administered. At each of the hospitals, there are also resident clinics that are run primarily by the chief residents including patients with reconstructive and cosmetic problems. Attending surgeons are available on site for consultation and supervision. They also see patients independently in their own clinic (cosmetic and reconstructive at BIDMC and MGH) with ready availability of senior faculty for consultation.  The chief resident, although supervised, has responsibility for planning and execution of surgical procedures and major responsibility with supervised independent decision-making in preoperative and postoperative care.

Microsurgery lab.

Research cartilage tissue engineering, mechanisms of neural injury and regeneration, limb transplantation and immune tolerance, new techniques for free flap monitoring, free flap physiology

Hand Fellowship.

Shriners Hospital for Children, Boston

The Shriners Hospital for Children, Boston  is one of four Shriners Burns Hospitals and one of 22 Shriners Hospitals for Children in North America. The Boston facility became operational in 1968.  The facility currently has 30 beds, admits over 1,000 children and treats more than 5,000 children through the outpatient clinics on an annual basis. The Shriners Hospital provides acute and reconstructive care to children who have been burned, as well as children with congenital and acquired malformations from throughout the world. Harvard plastic surgery residents rotate through the Shriners Hospital in the PGY 5 year. Residents are exposed to the complex and challenging spectrum of burn reconstruction, as well as pediatric plastic surgery including cleft lip and palate, ear construction, and vascular malformations. Residents often elect to participate in the operative management of acute burn injuries, as well as the management of special skin disorders including toxic epidermal necrolysis (TEN), staphylococcal scalded skin syndrome, and epidermolysis bullosa. The attending physicians at the Boston Shriners Hospital are affiliated with MGH and hold teaching appointments in Harvard Medical School.