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Howard Hiatt, MD, of the Division of Social Medicine and Health Inequalities, last month was inducted into the Royal College of Physicians, the oldest medical institution in England.
Hiatt was nominated by Don Berwick, president and chief executive officer of the Cambridge-based Institute for Healthcare Improvement and a member of the Royal College of Physicians. The college was established by King Henry VIII in 1518, and since then has engaged in a wide range of activities aimed at upholding and improving standards of medical practice.
Hiatt received his MD from Harvard University and completed fellowships at Cornell University and the National Institutes of Health. He was physician-in-chief at Beth Israel Hospital, Herrman L. Blumgart professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School from 1963-1972 and dean of the Harvard School of Public Health from 1972 to 1984, during which he established new programs in evaluative clinical sciences, health care economics, decision theory, policy management education and applications of modern molecular biology to classical global health burdens. These efforts helped change thinking and strategy in many other national and international schools of public health. Hiatt also helped form BWH’s Division of Social Medicine and Health Inequalities, which trains young clinicians in issues bearing on health inequalities worldwide.