example, is incredibly knowledgeable about the diagnosis and treatment of Lyme and other tick-borne illnesses. At Mass General, we have Dr. Allen Steere, who discovered Lyme disease when he was at Yale. We certainly see some of the more advanced cases that require specialized care. So my understanding is that there’s already a fair amount of collaboration clinically and academically.
N MAGAZINE: Do specialists who come here from Mass General enjoy coming to the island? DR. SLAVIN: I think they particularly enjoy it in the summer months. But I think they enjoy practicing in something other than an academic medical center. It’s a wonderful experience that contrasts with what they experience in Boston.
N MAGAZINE: What is the benefit of Mass General being affiliated with the Nantucket Cottage Hospital? DR. SLAVIN: Our mission is to improve health, so improving the health of the people of Nantucket is something that is important to us. We do benefit from the referrals that come our way from patients who are in need of secondary, or tertiary, or quaternary care.
"The staff at Nantucket Cottage Hospital is terrific, and now they finally have a facility to use to the benefit of the patients here." — Dr. Peter Slavin
N magazine
N MAGAZINE: If there is a pervasive health
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issue here, it’s Lyme disease. How big of a priority is Lyme disease for Mass General and could you see a larger focus on Nantucket to find a cure or a vaccine? DR. SLAVIN: There is great expertise here on Nantucket. Dr. Timothy Lepore, for
rise to the national Affordable Care Act. If, God forbid, the Affordable Care Act were to come down in the future, I’m sure Massachusetts would do its best to intervene and pick up the pieces.
N MAGAZINE: U.S. News and World Report
recently ranked Mass General as the number two hospital in the country. How important are these rankings? DR. SLAVIN: First of all, we don’t believe our N MAGAZINE: Mass General is certainly competition is Mayo Clinic, Johns Hopnot immune to the political shifts in this kins, Cleveland Clinic or the Brigham country. Obamacare itself was a sea and Women’s Hospital. We feel honchange and that is now evolving. Where ored to be mentioned in the same sendoes the hospital tence as those stand in terms of other great in"We have no shortage of patients health insurance stitutions. Our at Mass General, but when we and how is that competition is get a call from Nantucket, it is a influencing your mental illness, very high priority for us to acbottom line? Lyme disease, commodate that patient." DR. SLAVIN: I think heart disease — Dr. Peter Slavin all hospitals in and cancer. this country are Those are the in favor of expanding health insurance to enemies that our staff wakes up every all Americans. We strongly support that morning to fight. But I think it was a idea. How you go about doing that, I think, nice shot in the arm for our staff to see is subject to debate. Where we are today, our rankings go up from number four to continuing to fine-tune and expand the two in this past year. Affordable Care Act, is certainly one approach. And other approaches have been N MAGAZINE: Can you give us a couple of discussed by a number of the Democratic tangible successes that Mass General has candidates for president, which would be to had in delivering life-altering treatments? expand Medicare to people under the age of DR. SLAVIN: Probably the thing we’re most sixty-five. I think you get there both ways, known for happened in 1846 when we first although one might be more politically ex- used ether to put someone asleep during pedient than the other. But expanding ac- surgery. That transformed surgery in the cess is something we care deeply about. country and around the world. But more re-
N MAGAZINE: How does an institution as large as Mass General stay nimble when every four or eight years there could be major changes in health insurance? DR. SLAVIN: We benefit from the fact that we’re in the state of Massachusetts, which is also deeply committed to access to health care for its citizens. Massachusetts buffers us from some of the national changing political winds that are out there. After all, it was Massachusetts’ health reform that gave
cently, we’ve contributed to major advances in targeted therapies for cancer—immunologic therapies for cancer. Just ten years ago, the Ragon family helped us establish the Ragon Institute, which is an immunology institute focused primarily on HIV and currently producing what is viewed as the most promising HIV vaccine that is in clinical trials in Africa. So the research is incredibly powerful and is having and will continue to have a major impact on the health of our patients and the people of the world.