Harvard Establishes CAM Institute 36408

Harvard Establishes CAM Institute

BOSTON--In late April, Harvard Medical School established theOsher Institute for Research and Education in Complementary and IntegrativeMedical Therapies. Recently, Harvard also added the Division for Research andEducation in Complementary and Integrative Medical Therapies. A $10 million giftfrom the Bernard Osher Foundation, based in San Francisco, and a $2 millioncontribution from Harvard Medical School are funding the new institute.

According to the school, the Institute was created to bring togethercross-disciplines to rigorously evaluate complementary and integrativetherapies. In particular, researchers will test the safety, efficacy, mechanismsof action and cost-effectiveness of these treatments.

We need to evaluate scientifically the effectiveness of these techniques,to assess the current status of our knowledge and to determine what we need todo to advance that knowledge, said Joseph Martin, dean of Harvard MedicalSchool.

David Eisenberg, an associate professor at Beth Israel Deaconess MedicalCenter, a hospital affiliated with Harvard, will direct both the Division andInstitute. My hope is that when five or 10 universities have sustainable[means for funding] research, education and responsible patient care in thisarea, we will forget the terms alternative and complementaryaltogether and simply provide the best available medicine, Eisenberg stated.

According to the Bernard Osher Foundation, its mission is to improve thequality of peoples lives. In 1998, the foundation gave $10 million to theUniversity of California, San Francisco, to develop the Osher Center forIntegrative Medicine. For more information, visit www.hms.harvard.edu.