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Mount Sinai palliative care specialist receives National Academy of Medicine award
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Diane E. Meier, MD, FACP, received the National Academy of Medicine’s Gustav O. Leinhard Award for Advancement of Health Care.
The award recognizes Meier’s efforts to increase awareness and adoption of palliative care services in the United States.
Meier — professor of geriatrics and palliative medicine at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, director of the Center to Advance Palliative Care, and a HemOnc Today Editorial Board member — received a medal and $40,000.
As a geriatrician, Meier determined that modern medicine’s focus on curing disease and prolonging life ignored crucial elements of patients’ and families’ distress, including pain, depression, anxiety, sleeplessness and other symptoms.
Through her work at Mount Sinai and the Center to Advance Palliative Care, she determined the essential components of palliative care and clarified the beneficial effects it has on patients and their families. She later established the Hertzberg Palliative Care Institute at Mount Sinai.
The research she conducted, as well as the guidelines and quality standards she helped to develop, have contributed to considerable growth in palliative care programs across the country.
“Meier’s tireless work as a researcher and as a clinician has resulted in reducing the pain and emotional distress of countless individuals and their families struggling with serious illness,” Victor J. Dzau, MD, president of National Academy of Medicine, said in a press release.