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William T. Lester, M.D.

TitleInstructor in Medicine
InstitutionMassachusetts General Hospital
DepartmentMedicine
AddressMassachusetts General Hospital
Lab of Computer Science
55 Fruit St
Boston MA 02114
Phone617/726-3909

 Biography 
 awards and honors
1986 - 1987Chimes Honorary
1987 - 1989Eta Kappa Nu
1997 - 1997Alpha Omega Alpha
2004 - 2004Award Winner MGH Clinical Research Day: FastTrack to Improved Hyperlipidemia Management: Closing the

 Overview 
 overview
My work in medical informatics is the product of my clinical experience in internal medicine with my engineering and medical informatics training. My research focuses on increasing the effectiveness of clinical information systems as it relates to improving evidence based care. By examining physician workflow and identifying and overcoming barriers to effective disease management in primary and specialty care, my health services research activities have focused on improving hyperlipidemia disease management, increasing preventative cancer screening rates and improving timely evidence-based HIV care. I have taken advantage of my expertise in system design and engineering to develop and test hypotheses regarding improved information delivery and medical decision making at the point of care. My work also investigates novel ways to improve care with non-visit and population-based quality improvement interventions. By collaborating with others, I have worked to more completely understand physician decision making in order to lay the groundwork for designing interventions to improve diabetes management in primary and specialty care.

As an instructor, I have focused my efforts on medical student and residency training in primary care internal medicine, urgent care and in medical informatics. I have mentored students for both research and clinically related endeavors. In my role as assistant fellowship director in medical informatics, I advise Biomedical Informatics research fellows for research and thesis projects on an individual basis and I run formal academic meetings for our laboratory. I also serve as preceptor for residents in internal medicine completing their primary care rotations as well as for medical students on core medicine clerkships.

As a primary care clinician, from the beginning of my medical training, I have placed high value on the quality longitudinal relationship that develops between physician and patient. In addition to maintaining a wonderfully rewarding primary care panel and to maintain a broad clinical exposure I see my own inpatients on the wards and continue practicing weekly in The Internal Medicine Associates Urgent Care Clinic.


 Bibliographic 
 selected publications
Publications listed below are automatically derived from MEDLINE/PubMed and other sources, which might result in incorrect or missing publications. Faculty can login to make corrections and additions.
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  1. Robbins GK, Lester W, Johnson KL, Chang Y, Estey G, Surrao D, Zachary K, Lammert SM, Chueh HC, Meigs JB, Freedberg KA. Efficacy of a Clinical Decision-Support System in an HIV Practice: A Randomized Trial. Ann Intern Med. 2012 Dec 4; 157(11):757-66.
    View in: PubMed
  2. Atlas SJ, Ashburner JM, Chang Y, Lester WT, Barry MJ, Grant RW. Population-based breast cancer screening in a primary care network. Am J Manag Care. 2012 Dec; 18(12):821-9.
    View in: PubMed
  3. Pablo Moreno-Ger, Javier Torrente, Yichuan Grace Hsieh, William T Lester. Advances in Human-Computer Interaction. Usability Testing for Serious Games: Making Informed Design Decisions with User Data. 2012; 2012:Article ID 369637, 13 pages.
  4. Ronquillo JG, Li C, Lester WT. Genetic testing behavior and reporting patterns in electronic medical records for physicians trained in a primary care specialty or subspecialty. J Am Med Inform Assoc. 2012 Jul-Aug; 19(4):570-4.
    View in: PubMed
  5. Atlas SJ, Grant RW, Lester WT, Ashburner JM, Chang Y, Barry MJ, Chueh HC. A cluster-randomized trial of a primary care informatics-based system for breast cancer screening. J Gen Intern Med. 2011 Feb; 26(2):154-61.
    View in: PubMed
  6. Lester WT, Ashburner JM, Grant RW, Chueh HC, Barry MJ, Atlas SJ. Mammography FastTrack: an intervention to facilitate reminders for breast cancer screening across a heterogeneous multi-clinic primary care network. J Am Med Inform Assoc. 2009 Mar-Apr; 16(2):187-95.
    View in: PubMed
  7. Zai AH, Grant RW, Estey G, Lester WT, Andrews CT, Yee R, Mort E, Chueh HC. Lessons from implementing a combined workflow-informatics system for diabetes management. J Am Med Inform Assoc. 2008 Jul-Aug; 15(4):524-33.
    View in: PubMed
  8. Lester WT, Zai AH, Chueh HC, Grant RW. Diabetes information technology: designing informatics systems to catalyze change in clinical care. J Diabetes Sci Technol. 2008 Mar; 2(2):275-83.
    View in: PubMed
  9. Lester WT, Zai AH, Grant RW, Chueh HC. Designing healthcare information technology to catalyse change in clinical care. Inform Prim Care. 2008; 16(1):9-19.
    View in: PubMed
  10. Scheufele EL, Blesius C, Lester WT. Facilitating group learning and dialogue between neighboring academic institutions using a collaborative web application framework. AMIA Annu Symp Proc. 2007; 1107.
    View in: PubMed
  11. Jernigan M, Lester W. Facilitating transitions to EMR adoption through client-side electronic documentation. AMIA Annu Symp Proc. 2007; 992.
    View in: PubMed
  12. Lester WT, Norris R, Chueh HC. Quicksilver: a novel publish and subscribe clinical messaging platform. AMIA Annu Symp Proc. 2007; 1030.
    View in: PubMed
  13. Grant RW, Wexler DJ, Watson AJ, Lester WT, Cagliero E, Campbell EG, Nathan DM. How doctors choose medications to treat type 2 diabetes: a national survey of specialists and academic generalists. Diabetes Care. 2007 Jun; 30(6):1448-53.
    View in: PubMed
  14. Grant RW, Lester WT, Meigs JB, Chueh HC. New models of population management for patients with diabetes--using informatics tools to support primary care. Diabetes Res Clin Pract. 2006 Dec; 74 Suppl 2:S220-4.
    View in: PubMed
  15. Lester WT, Grant RW, Barnett GO, Chueh HC. Randomized controlled trial of an informatics-based intervention to increase statin prescription for secondary prevention of coronary disease. J Gen Intern Med. 2006 Jan; 21(1):22-9.
    View in: PubMed
  16. Lester WT, Grant RW, Chueh HC. Closing the knowledge-performance gap of hperlipidemia management: preliminary results of a randomized controlled trial. Proceedings of the 5th Scientific Forum on Quality of Care and Outcomes Research in Cardiovascular Disease and Stroke. 2004.
  17. Lester WT, Grant RW, Chueh HC. Guidelines vs reality: Physician explanations for not adjusting cholesterol therapy. Proceedings of the 27th Annual Meeting of the Society of General Internal Medicine. 2004.
  18. Lester WT, Grant R, Barnett GO, Chueh H. Facilitated lipid management using interactive e-mail: preliminary results of a randomized controlled trial. Stud Health Technol Inform. 2004; 107(Pt 1):232-6.
    View in: PubMed
  19. Marsh DR, Hinds LR, Lester WS, Reinking BE, Booth FW. The force-frequency relationship is altered in regenerating and senescent rat skeletal muscle. Muscle Nerve. 1998 Oct; 21(10):1265-74.
    View in: PubMed
  20. Lester WT, Gonzalez RV, Fernandez B, Barr RE. A neural network approach to electromyographic signal processing for a motor control task. 1997; 119(2):335-337.
  21. Biegler F, Wong C, Reuben J, Lester WT. Cement stresses under all-polyethylene tibial total knee replacements. 42nd Annual Meeting, Orthopaedic Research Society. 1996.
  22. Wong C, Biegler F, Reuben J, Lester WT. Comparison of cement stresses in all-polyethylene and metal-backed total knee replacements. Mid-America Orthopaedic Association Annual Meeting. 1996.
  23. Lester WT, Fernandez B, Gonzalez R, Barr R. A neural network approach to electromyographic signal processing for a motor control task. American Society Of Mechanical Engineers. 1994.
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