Elizabeth A. Howell, MD, MPP, Director of the new Women’s Health Research Institute, right, with Michael Brodman, MD, and Annetine C. Gelijns, PhD, JD.

The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai has created the Women’s Health Research Institute, with the mission of advancing science in women’s health. The Director of the Institute is a nationally recognized physician-scientist, Elizabeth A. Howell, MD, MPP, System Vice Chair of Research and Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Science, and Professor of Population Health Science and Policy, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.

“Developing a rigorous research program in women’s health is an essential component of the strategic plan of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and a natural complement to Mount Sinai’s rapidly growing clinical services and fellowship training programs in this area,” says Eric J. Nestler, MD, PhD, Dean for Academic and Scientific Affairs, Director, The Friedman Brain Institute, and Nash Family Professor of Neuroscience.

Dr. Howell laid the groundwork for the Institute with the close collaboration of Michael Brodman, MD, Ellen and Howard C. Katz Chair and Professor, Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Science; and Annetine C. Gelijns, PhD, JD, Chair and Edmond A. Guggenheim Professor, Population Health Science and Policy. The two departments are co-sponsors of the new interdisciplinary Institute.

“I think that now is a great time for women’s health research,” says Dr. Howell. “You see a lot of clinical centers of care for women, but you do not see many that are focused on the science of women’s health.”

Two Centers of Excellence will provide the initial platform for achieving the Institute’s goals:

• The Center for Outcomes and Quality Research in Women’s Health

With particular attention to underserved populations, the Center will build upon Mount Sinai’s strong research portfolio on quality of care and outcomes, with a focus on developing and evaluating interventions to improve women’s health and wellness.

• The Center for Early Translational Research in Women’s Health

Drawing on the expertise of multiple departments, institutes, and programs, the Center will develop tools and core resources for translational research in genetics and immunology and build new diagnostic and treatment techniques for gynecologic cancers and other conditions in women’s health.

“The idea is that the same topic areas can be studied at both centers,” Dr. Howell says. “Looking at cervical cancer, for example, you can address screening, treatment practices, and patterns in health services. At the same time, you could be doing advanced work on tumor immunology and trying to find ways to diagnose it earlier and treat it more effectively. The centers will be very integrated, but you need both.”

The Institute is now seeking a director for the Center for Early Translational Research and recruiting senior and junior faculty members with expertise in women’s health, health services research, cancer research, and other complementary fields.  The Institute also hopes to establish the Women’s Health Scholars Program, recruiting residents and fellows to spend an additional year learning research methodology for a career in women’s health.

Dr. Howell sees strong potential for working with the centers across the institution, and she is already working closely with Stephanie V. Blank, MD, Director of Women’s Health at Mount Sinai Chelsea.  Dr. Blank will be the clinical lead for the Center for Early Translational Research in Women’s Health, and because she treats many patients with gynecologic cancer, “she will be one of the key people who can bring both our questions and our learning to the bedside,” Dr. Howell says.  Drs. Blank and Howell aim to build a strong ovarian cancer research program as part of this effort.

The Institute is also expanding and building on Dr. Howell’s work. Supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health, she leads research concerning maternal depression, outcomes for very low birth-weight babies, and the effect of hospital quality on severe complications and death in childbirth, which are persistently higher for black women and other ethnic minorities, compared with white women.

In a 2016 study published in the American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology, Dr. Howell’s team looked at 353,773 deliveries in 40 New York City hospitals from 2011 through 2013, and found that some of hospitals had rates of serious complications as low as 1 percent, while others had rates up to 6 percent. The study also found that 65 percent of white women delivered at hospitals with the lowest number of complications, and only 23 percent of black women did. “We need to figure out how to address these disparities, and why some hospitals are doing so much better than others,” Dr. Howell says.

“I am very interested in quality of care in general and how we measure it, how we improve it. Those kinds of issues—particularly in maternal and child health—resonate for me,” Dr. Howell says. The interest was present in her earliest days as at Harvard Medical School, when she had a neonatal rotation, caring for infants who were “so small and fragile” and who faced a lifetime of potential complications. Looking at the bigger picture, she also earned a master’s degree in Public Policy at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, writing her thesis on infant mortality.

“I always knew that I love patient care,” Dr. Howell says, “but I also knew that I wanted to have a broader impact if I could.”