Educating healthcare teams

Preventing prenatal alcohol exposure

Improving outcomes for individuals with FASD

About Us

Boston Medical Center


Boston Medical Center (BMC) is a private, not-for-profit, 514-bed, academic medical center and the primary teaching affiliate for Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine.

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BMC emphasizes community-based care, with its mission to provide consistently accessible health services to all. The largest safety net hospital in New England, BMC provides the full spectrum of pediatric and adult care, from primary care and family medicine to advanced specialty care, in more than 70 subspecialties. Three-fourths of our patients come from underserved populations, such as the low-income and elderly, who rely on government payers such as Medicaid, the Health Safety Net, and Medicare for their coverage. Two-thirds are racial and ethnic minorities and 32 percent do not speak English at home.

BMC is the tertiary care center in Boston HealthNet, an affiliation of BMC, BUSM, and 14 community clinics in Boston's most impoverished neighborhoods. BMC is also a recognized leader in groundbreaking medical research and is the 15th largest recipient of funding in the US from the NIH among independent hospitals.

BMC has extensive experience working with clinics throughout Massachusetts and New England to transform addiction treatment by integrating the Massachusetts Model of Nurse Care Management into adult primary care practices.

The CARE Unit (a collaboration of BMC and BUSM) will house the SAFEST Choice Program. The CARE Unit was established in the BMC Section of General Internal Medicine in 1993 with the mission to educate health professionals, provide healthcare, and inform clinical and public health practice and policy to improve the lives of individuals with substance use problems. For 25 years, the CARE Unit faculty and staff have developed innovative programs in outpatient, inpatient, and community settings that help providers identify and care for some of the most vulnerable patients - those with substance use and substance use disorders and their medical and psychiatric complications.

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Proof Alliance


Proof Alliance is a nonprofit founded in 1998 in Minnesota with a dual purpose — providing education on the impact of PAE, and championing efforts to enable individuals living with an FASD to reach their full potential.

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Proof Alliance works to prevent PAE and to improve the quality of life of the individuals and families affected by FASD by providing resources and support in Minnesota and beyond. By building partnerships and improving services, it generates awareness of the importance of alcohol-free pregnancies.

Proof Alliance has had extensive experience with implementing screening for both prenatal alcohol use and FASD over the past 10 years. They started working with primary care in 2011 to determine how to screen for FASD in pediatric settings. The AAP had not yet released their FASD Toolkit at that time, so Proof Alliance assembled a medical advisory committee to create an algorithm on how to screen for FASD. They piloted this FASD screening algorithm with four clinics over three years, which created opportunities for many lessons learned on what this screening looks like in practice. The clinics were able to add the FASD screening protocol into their EMR, have staff trained on FASD and the screening method, change their practice, and embed it into their standard of care.

In addition to their work on FASD screening in pediatric care, Proof Alliance has also worked with numerous clinics providing prenatal care to implement screening for alcohol use during pregnancy.

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Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine


Barry M. Manuel Center for Continuing Education at Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine designs, implements, and assesses evidence-based education for the healthcare team to advance their skills/strategies and performance, optimally leading to improved patient outcomes.

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We deliver activities in a wide variety of educational formats at the local, regional, and national level.

We lead the quality improvement efforts of healthcare practitioners with the goal of enabling our healthcare teams to achieve improved performance in practice. We partner with other organizations to address community and population health issues and integrate strategies to improve public health. We leverage practice and health data to teach healthcare improvement and build improvement capacity. We engage in educational research and scholarship to further the practice of accredited continuing education.

https://cme.bu.edu/

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Daniel P. Alford, MD, MPH Principal Investigator, Faculty Boston Medical Center, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
Jacqueline S. German, MPH Program Director Boston Medical Center, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
Vincent C. Smith, MD, MPH Co-investigator, Faculty Boston Medical Center, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
Nicole Kitten, MPH Program Manager Boston Medical Center
Kendra Gludt, MPH Co-Principal Investigator, Faculty Proof Alliance
Ashlie McGuire, MA Ed Training Manager Proof Alliance
Ilana Hardesty, MA Program Operations Manager Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
Catherine Pagliaro, BS Program Assistant Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
Marilyn Augustyn, MD, MPH Boston Medical Center, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
Diane Banigo DNP, APRN, CNM iFOB Consulting and MN Community Care
Donna Beers, MSN, RN-BC, CARN Boston Medical Center
Amelia Burgess, MD, MPH Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation
Valerie DeCora Guimaraes, DNP, MA RN Mayo Clinic
Kelley Saia, MD Boston Medical Center, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
Mary Jo Spencer, CNP, APRN, MPH Proof Alliance
Yasuko Yamamura, MD University of Minnesota Medical School
Julia Conkel Ziebell, PhD, LP Proof Alliance
Sara Crotteau, MSW Hennepin County Child Protection ICWA (Indian Child Welfare Act)
Maria Muzik, MD University of Michigan
Gina Capra, MPA Bethesda, MD
Sara Messelt St. Paul, MN
Valerie DeCora Guimaraes, DNP, MA, RN Rochester, MN
Jeffrey Wozniak, PhD Minneapolis, MN
Enid Watson, M.Div Rhode Island
Matthew Malek, MD, MPH Woonsocket, RI
Cresta Jones, MD Burnsville, MN
Madonna Mooney, BS Ed Scarborough, ME
Jessica Fowler, BS North Branch, MN
Sue Terwey, MS St. Paul, MN
Michele Valdez, BA New York, NY
Miriam Komaromy, MD Boston, MA
Mary Carpenter, MD Winner, SD