Surgery News & Notes

Raphael Bueno, MD, chief of Thoracic Surgery and co-director of the Lung Center at Brigham and Women’s Hospital was recently awarded a $2.3M grant to investigate the tumor microenvironment in non-small cell lung cancer. Roche/Genentech ImCore Network is funding the three year study, “Deciphering the Immune Desert in Thoracic Malignancies“. The goals of the study are to map the interaction microenvironment of lung cancers and their lymph node channels in treated and naïve patients in order to identify potential targets for therapy.

Raphael Bueno, MD
Fredric G. Levin Distinguished Chair in Thoracic Surgery and Lung Cancer Research, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Chief of Thoracic Surgery, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Co-Director, Lung Center, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Professor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School

Raphael Bueno, MD, is chief of thoracic surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) and professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School. He completed his bachelor’s degree at Harvard College and medical training at Harvard Medical School/Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He subsequently trained in general surgery at BWH and thoracic surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital, and joined the BWH thoracic faculty in 1996. Over the past 21 years, Bueno has developed robust clinical and research portfolios at BWH.

His clinical focus is management of thoracic malignancies, including mesothelioma, lung cancer, and esophageal cancer. His main research interests center on the molecular events that lead to malignancy in mesothelioma and lung cancer. Specifically, Bueno focuses on developing biomarkers for diagnosis, prognosis, and predicting therapy in malignant pleural mesothelioma and lung cancer. His research also includes tumor sequencing and identification of targetable pathways. He runs a molecular biology lab at the George W. Thorn Medical Research Building and has been funded for almost two decades by the National Cancer Institute, Department of Defense, foundations and industry grants. He also invented, patented, and licensed several algorithms and medical devices for patient care. Bueno has also invented and continues to develop several novel surgical procedures.

Bueno is a member of numerous prestigious national and international professional societies. He has been an invited lecturer at teaching hospitals and universities around the country and internationally. At BWH, he has built the largest division of thoracic surgery in the US, with 21 faculty members and five affiliated network sites in New England, and co-founded the BWH Lung Center. Bueno continues to push the boundaries of what is possible in patient care.

Louis L. Nguyen, MD, MPH, MBA, has been appointed associate chair for digital health systems in the Department of Surgery (DoS). In this newly created role, Dr. Nguyen will be accountable for the design and implementation of the electronic health record and other information systems across the DoS.

Dr. Nguyen will both lead and enable digital practice innovation with the goals of increasing practice efficiency and safety, enabling practice growth through novel patient management interactions and optimizing the DoS provider-facing presence in eCare.

In addition, Dr. Nguyen will advise the various Brigham Health (BH) IT committees and work with DoS faculty members and leadership to continually evolve our information systems in a progressive manner.

Louis L. Nguyen, MD, MPH, MBA
Associate Chair for Digital Health Systems, Department of Surgery, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Associate Professor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School

Louis L. Nguyen, MD, MPH, MBA, is a vascular surgeon and the director of vascular surgery clinical and outcomes research at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH). In addition, he is an associate professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School and the clinical lead for surgery at Partners eCare.

Dr. Nguyen received his medical degree from the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine and his business degree at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business in Chicago, IL. He then completed a general surgery residency at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis, MO followed by a vascular surgery fellowship at BWH and masters of public health at Harvard T.H. Chan School Public Health. He is board certified in vascular surgery.

Dr. Nguyen’s clinical interests include the treatment of venous disease and thoracic outlet syndrome, being recognized for innovations in imaging and treatment algorithms for primary and recurrent TOS. His funded research is in the field of health economics and the study of socioeconomic factors on provider decisions and patient outcomes. He also mentors young researchers on analytical methods for large databases.

A recognized leader in health services research and outcomes implementation, Dr. Nguyen has held several leadership roles, including chair of the Society for Vascular Surgery’s (SVS) comparative effectiveness research committee, member of the SVS Governing Council for the Patient Safety Organization and SVS liaison to the American College of Surgery National Surgical Quality Improvement Program, where he led the creation of the vascular database modules. His informatics work includes design of clinical workflows and EHR systems that promote safe, effective, and high value care across a large healthcare network.

The following Department of Surgery faculty members were recently promoted:

Ciaran McNamee, MD, MSc, of the Division of Vascular Surgery to assistant professor of surgery, part time, at Harvard Medical School.

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Matthew T. Menard, MD, of the Division of Vascular and Endovascular Surgery to associate professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School.

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Elizabeth A. Mittendorf, MD, PhD, of the Division of Breast Surgery to associate professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School.

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Matthew Mossanen, MD, MPH, of the Division of Urology to assistant professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School.

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Malcolm K. Robinson, MD, of the Division of General and Gastrointestinal Surgery to associate professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School.

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Prem S. Shekar, MD, of the Division of Cardiac Surgery to associate professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School.

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Assunta De Rienzo, PhD, Lead Investigator in the Division of Thoracic Surgery to assistant professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School.