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Jerry Avorn

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Jerry Avorn (born February 13, 1948) is a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and Chief Emeritus of the Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomics at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.[1] He founded one of the largest programs using health care utilization data to track medication use and outcomes, and pioneered the practice of "academic detailing" in which pharmacists, nurses, and physicians interactively educate doctors about evidence-based prescribing practices using the same tactics that drug companies employ to market their products.

Early life and education

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Avorn was born in 1948, in New York City and grew up in Rockaway, Queens. He graduated from Far Rockaway H.S., where he was editor of the student newspaper, The Chat. While attending Columbia University during the opposition to the Vietnam War and American civil rights movement, he opposed the Vietnam War through his investigative journalism for the Columbia Daily Spectator. In the summer of 1969, he wrote Up Against the Ivy Wall: A History of the Columbia Crisis with fellow Spectator journalists about the campus uprising there.[2] He graduated from Columbia with a B.A. in 1969 and M.D. from Harvard Medical School in 1974.[3]

Career

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Avorn was an intern in medicine at the Cambridge Hospital in Cambridge, Massachusetts and then completed his residency at the Beth Israel Hospital (now the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, Massachusetts). He became an associate professor at Harvard Medical School in 1985 and a full professor in 2005.[4]

In 1983, Avorn published his first paper on academic detailing in The New England Journal of Medicine, reporting on a randomized controlled trial of the approach among 435 doctors in four states.[5] It was followed by another report in the same journal of a randomized controlled trial that used academic detailing to reduce over-prescribing of sedating medications in nursing home patients.[6] The approach has been documented to be effective in two systemic reviews,[7][8] and has been taken up by several health care systems, insurers, and governments in the U.S., Canada, Europe, and Australia. This work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post and on The Daily Show.[9][10][11]

Avorn is a past president and fellow of the International Society for Pharmacoepidemiology.[12][13]

In 2004, he founded Alosa Health, a nonprofit organization that develops and implements academic detailing programs to improve prescribing, where he serves pro bono.[14]

Avorn's group's paper on coxibs was one of the first medical research papers to demonstrate that Vioxx increased some patients' risk of heart attack and stroke.[15] In 2006 he testified as a plaintiff’s expert witness in the Vioxx litigation, but he donated all profit from his involvement to charitable causes. He is one of the most highly cited authors in his field.[16]

Works

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Avorn is the author of the 2004 book Powerful Medicines and the 2025 book Rethinking Medications.[17][18]

Notable research

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  • Avorn, Jerry; Soumerai, Stephen B. (1983). "A New Approach to Reducing Suboptimal Drug Use". JAMA. 250 (13): 1752–1753. doi:10.1001/jama.1983.03340130070037. ISSN 0098-7484. PMID 6411945.
  • Solomon, Daniel H.; Glynn, Robert J.; Levin, Raisa; Avorn, Jerry (2002). "Nonsteroidal Anti-inflammatory Drug Use and Acute Myocardial Infarction". Archives of Internal Medicine. 162 (10): 1099–1104. doi:10.1001/archinte.162.10.1099. ISSN 0003-9926. PMID 12020178.
  • Solomon, Daniel H.; Avorn, Jerry; Stürmer, Til; Glynn, Robert J.; Mogun, Helen; Schneeweiss, Sebastian (2006). "Cardiovascular Outcomes in New Users of Coxibs and Nonsteroidal Antiinflammatory Drugs". Arthritis & Rheumatism. 54 (5): 1378–1389. doi:10.1002/art.21887. ISSN 0004-3591. PMID 16645966. ResearchGate:7135233.

References

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  1. ^ "Home". Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomics, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital. Retrieved 2025-11-06.
  2. ^ Avorn, Jerry; Crane, Andrew; Jaffe, Mark; Root, Jr., Oren; Starr, Paul; Stern, Michael; Stulberg, Robert (1968). Friedman, Robert (ed.). Up Against the Ivy Wall: A History of the Columbia Crisis. New York, NY: Atheneum Press. ISBN 9780689702365.
  3. ^ "Jerry Avorn, MD". NaRCAD. Retrieved 2023-03-05.
  4. ^ "Jerome Lewis Avorn, M.D." Harvard Catalyst Profiles. Retrieved 2025-11-05.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  5. ^ Avorn, Jerry; Soumerai, Stephen B. (1983-06-16). "Improving Drug-Therapy Decisions through Educational Outreach: A Randomized Controlled Trial of Academically Based Detailing". New England Journal of Medicine. 308 (24): 1457–1463. doi:10.1056/NEJM198306163082406. ISSN 0028-4793.
  6. ^ Avorn, Jerry; Soumerai, Stephen B.; Everitt, Daniel E.; Ross-Degnan, Dennis; Beers, Mark H.; Sherman, David; Salem-Schatz, Susanne R.; Fields, David (1992-07-16). "A Randomized Trial of a Program to Reduce the Use of Psychoactive Drugs in Nursing Homes". New England Journal of Medicine. 327 (3): 168–173. doi:10.1056/NEJM199207163270306. ISSN 0028-4793.
  7. ^ O'Brien, Mary Ann; Rogers, Stephen; Jamtvedt, Gro; Oxman, Andrew; Odgaard-Jensen, Jan; Kristoffersen, Doris Tove; Forsetlund, Louise; Bainbridge, Daryl; Freemantle, Nick; Davis, Dave; Haynes, R. Brian; Harvey, Emma (2007-10-17). "Educational outreach visits: effects on professional practice and health care outcomes". Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews. doi:10.1002/14651858.CD000409.pub2. PMC 7032679.
  8. ^ Rome, Benjamin N.; Dancel, Ellen; Chaitoff, Alexander; Trombetta, Dominick; Roy, Shuvro; Fanikos, Paul; Germain, Jayda; Avorn, Jerry (2025-01-08). "Academic Detailing Interventions and Evidence-Based Prescribing: A Systematic Review". JAMA Network Open. 8 (1): e2453684. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.53684. ISSN 2574-3805. PMC 12543401. PMID 39775805.
  9. ^ Hensley, Scott (2006-03-14). "As Drug Bill Soars, Some Doctors Get An 'Unsales' Pitch - WSJ". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved 2025-11-06.
  10. ^ "Combating the opioid crisis one doctor at a time". The Washington Post. 2019-02-02. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 2025-11-06.
  11. ^ "John Malkovich", The Daily Show, 2006-05-04, retrieved 2025-11-06
  12. ^ "ISPE Fellows-advanced leadership in ISPE-pharmacoepi.org-FISPE - International Society for Pharmacoepidemiology". www.pharmacoepi.org. Retrieved 2025-11-06.
  13. ^ "History-pharmacoepi.org - International Society for Pharmacoepidemiology". www.pharmacoepi.org. Retrieved 2025-11-06.
  14. ^ "Academic Detailers". Alosa Health. Retrieved 2025-11-06.
  15. ^ Solomon, Daniel H.; Schneeweiss, Sebastian; Glynn, Robert J.; Kiyota, Yuka; Levin, Raisa; Mogun, Helen; Avorn, Jerry (2004-05-04). "Relationship Between Selective Cyclooxygenase-2 Inhibitors and Acute Myocardial Infarction in Older Adults". Circulation. 109 (17): 2068–2073. doi:10.1161/01.CIR.0000127578.21885.3E. ISSN 0009-7322.
  16. ^ "Jerry Avorn: Medicine H-index & Awards - Academic Profile". Research.com. Retrieved 2025-11-06.
  17. ^ "Home page". Powerful Medicines. Retrieved 2025-11-06.
  18. ^ "Home". Rethink Medications. Retrieved 2025-11-06.
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