CHA Physician Receives Reducing Health Disparities Award From Mass. Medical Society

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – Cambridge Health Alliance (CHA) physician Marie-Louise Jean-Baptiste, MD, has won the Reducing Health Disparities Award presented by the Massachusetts Medical Society (MMS).The award recognizes an individual who has made exceptional contributions to reducing health disparities due to race, socioeconomic status, age, education, or sexual orientation.

Dr. Jean-Baptiste’s colleagues at CHA recognized her as an “admired and ardent educator and a paragon clinician, one who has blessed our community and the medical profession with a lifetime of tireless commitment to justice for the disadvantaged with great results.”

Board certified in internal medicine, Dr. Jean-Baptiste has practiced primary care at CHA’s Windsor Street Health Center in Cambridge since 2009. A 1979 graduate of the Faculty of Medicine of Haiti, she completed her internship and residency at CHA’s Cambridge Hospital from 1986-1989, and following her residency and a Clinical Fellowship at Harvard Medical School, she joined the staff of Cambridge Hospital.

Besides her clinical responsibilities, Dr. Jean-Baptiste has been Director of Minority Affairs for CHA Cambridge Hospital since 2005 and Medical Director for CHA’s Health Care for the Homeless program since 2009. In 1989, she was appointed as an Instructor in Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and in 2002 was named Assistant Professor of Medicine.

The MMS’s Reducing Health Disparities Award is the latest of many honors presented to Dr. Jean-Baptiste. Among them are the Dean’s Community Service Achievement Medal and the Charles McCabe Faculty Prize for Excellence in Teaching, both from Harvard Medical School; the Community Award from the Collaboration of Haitian Providers for World AIDS Day; the Caregiver Award from Cambridge Care About AIDS; a Community Award from the Haitian American Solidarity Alliance for medical services given to the Haitian Community; and an award from the NAACP for medical services to the Cambridge community.

Cambridge Health Alliance is an academic community health system committed to providing high quality care in Cambridge, Somerville and Boston’s metro-north communities. CHA has expertise in primary care, specialty care and mental health/substance use services, as well as caring for diverse and complex populations. It includes three hospital campuses, a network of primary care and specialty practices and the Cambridge Public Health Dept. CHA patients have seamless access to advanced care through the system’s affiliation with Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. CHA is a Harvard Medical School teaching affiliate and is also affiliated with Harvard School of Public Health, Harvard School of Dental Medicine and Tufts University School of Medicine. For more information, visit www.challiance.org.