68 PORTLAND RELOCATION GUIDE – WINTER 2015 | SPRING 2016
wearable devices encourage users to make
sure they meet their activity goals each day.
Research shows that these employer wellness programs really work, especially when
it comes to shifting the paradigm from
reactionary treatment to the prevention of
serious illnesses. To that end, employees
of these progressive companies are able to
boost their personal productivity, reduce
their healthcare costs and take control of
their own lifestyle choices.
A LEADING HEALTHCARE
RESEARCH HUB
The U.S. government has just 11 research
centers it uses across the country to
determine which medical treatments
and practices work best for a wide range
of conditions. Two of them—OHSU’s
Evidence-Based Practice Center and Kaiser
Permanente’s Center for Health Research—
are in Portland, showing just how far the
city has come in establishing itself as a true
healthcare research hub not only in the
region, but also across the nation.
The OHSU Evidence-Based Practice
Center, in operation since 1997, has spent
more than $58 million over the past two
decades to study the effectiveness of medical
devices, services and medications. In that
time, its researchers have issued more than
200 reports on a broad range of important
topics—many of which have influenced the
work of medical practitioners throughout
the country and across the globe.
One of the most well known researchers in
the Pacific Northwest is Dr. Brian Druker, a
physician-scientist with OHSU in southwest
Portland. Dr. Druker first made a name for
himself through the development of a drug
called Gleevec to help treat the symptoms of
chronic myeloid leukemia.
More recently, however, Dr. Druker began
overseeing the development of a new $1
billion OHSU research center, after the institution successfully reached its Knight Cancer
Challenge goal of raising $500 million to
turn Portland into a cancer research hub
(with Nike founder Phil Knight matching
the amount). It is widely regarded as the
most successful fundraising effort for cancer
research in history in terms of the amount
of money raised, and it included more than
10,000 contributors in total.
As a result of this effort, Dr. Druker is now
working on recruiting up to 300 leading
scientists to conduct early-stage cancer
detection research. If successful, it would
likely turn Portland into one of the top
cancer research regions in the world.
In addition to the great things happening
at OHSU, there is also the somewhat lesser
known Kaiser Permanente Center for Health
Research, which engages in research within
large and diverse populations. Its Portland-based research facility has numerous
areas of focus, including cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, genetics, health
disparities, obesity, oral health, mental health
and substance abuse, among several others.
While the Center for Health Research has
a lower profile in its inconspicuous north
Portland building, the facility has also
become a national leader in the groundbreaking research its team has developed
in recent years.
DISRUPTING THE HEALTH-
CARE DELIVERY MODEL
Over the past decade, the Portland area
has become somewhat of a hub for innovative care delivery, due largely to the growth
of ZOOM+, a health clinic network that
recently began offering health insurance
to customers. Essentially, the organization
serves as a health system with insurance
Photos courtesy of
Tuality Healthcare
