Our History
Mass General Brigham's legacy is one of medical firsts, Nobel Laureates, and prestigious world-leading hospitals.
For more than 200 years, we have shaped health care through innovation, collaboration, and compassion. We have made groundbreaking contributions to the medical field, reflecting our long-standing approach of accepting challenges and advancing breakthroughs, including the first heart transplant in New England, the first triple organ transplant in the United States, and the first FDA-approved gene therapy to cure inherited blindness.
Today, we continue pioneering the future of medicine as a world-recognized leader in research. Through thousands of clinical trials, our physician-researchers continuously help bring new treatments and therapies to our patients. We are also recognized as one of the most innovative institutes in the country.
A timeline of Mass General Brigham
2024
Mass General Brigham announces plans to unify its academic medical center departments and launch multidisciplinary, disease-focused institutes in Cancer, Heart and Vascular, and Neuroscience.
2021
To better support the people who live and work in communities hardest hit by COVID-19, Mass General Brigham launches a fleet of community health vans in partnership with the DPV Transportation, a local transportation company.
2020
Mass General Brigham launches United Against Racism, a long-term, multi-million-dollar commitment to address the many impacts that racism has on Mass General Brigham patients, employees and the broader community.
2019
Partners HealthCare becomes Mass General Brigham—a name that captures a sense of pride, a spirit of excellence, and aligned commitment to those we serve.
2018
Massachusetts Eye and Ear joins the Partners HealthCare health system.
2017
Wentworth-Douglass Hospital joins the Partners HealthCare health system.
2016
Partners HealthCare opens a new building in Assembly Row, Somerville, unifying 4,500 employees under one roof to improve efficiency and reduce costs.
2015
Brigham and Women's Hospital geneticist Stephen J. Elledge, PhD, is awarded the 2015 Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award, also known as “America’s Nobel,” for laying a foundation for understanding how cells detect and repair DNA damage.
2013
Cooley Dickinson Hospital joins the Partners HealthCare health system.
2012
The division of Population Health Management is established to fulfill Partners’ commitment to providing high-quality, coordinated health care that is affordable and accessible.
Neighborhood Health Plan, a managed care plan founded by community health centers, becomes a member of Partners HealthCare.
2011
A multidisciplinary team at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, led by Bohdan Pomahac, MD, performs the first full-face transplant in the U.S., and goes on to complete three more in the same year.
Brigham and Women’s Hospital also performed its first bilateral hand transplant.
2010
In response to the earthquake that devastated Haiti, Brigham and Women’s, Mass General, Spaulding Rehabilitation, and Newton-Wellesley Hospitals send teams of caregivers abroad to help relief efforts.
Partners HealthCare becomes one of the first health systems in the nation to achieve its goal of having 100% of physicians using electronic health records (EHR).
2009
Mass General researcher Jack W. Szostak, PhD, wins the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase.
Partners HealthCare Biobank launches to collect and maintain samples from individuals who receive care at Brigham and Women’s, Spaulding Rehabilitation, and Massachusetts General Hospital, leading to research in multiple sclerosis, asthma, and whole genome integration.
2008
Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital earns National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research Model System distinctions in spinal cord injury, burn injury, and traumatic brain injury simultaneously.
2006
Martha’s Vineyard Hospital and Nantucket Hospital join the Partners HealthCare health system.
2005
Brigham and Women’s Hospital performs its 500th heart transplant, the most for any New England hospital. This historic operation adds Brigham and Women’s to an exclusive list of hospitals nationwide to reach this mark.
2001
Partners HealthCare Personalized Medicine is founded, originally named the Harvard Medical School-Partners HealthCare Center for Genetics and Genomics. Its mission is to accelerate the use of genetic and genomic information in the clinical setting.
2000
A Brigham and Women’s Hospital team performs a quadruple transplant, using four organs from a single donor, giving new hope to four patients.
Launch of Partners HealthCare at Home, an initiative that provides patients with a continuum of care and access to expert health care in their home.
1999
The Partners in Career and Workforce Development program begins for low-income community residents interested in careers in health care.
Newton-Wellesley Hospital joins the Partners HealthCare health system.
The Children’s Service at Massachusetts General Hospital is renamed Mass General Hospital for Children.
1998
Faulkner Hospital joins Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Partners HealthCare. Brigham and Women’s surgery and medicine residents begin rotations at Faulkner.
1997
Partners HealthCare International is founded to provide resources for overseas patients, governments, and medical professionals seeking relationships with the Partners HealthCare community.
Learn more about our Global Advisory Services
1996
Salem Hospital, formerly known as North Shore Medical Center, joins the Partners HealthCare health system, the first community-based hospital organization to do so.
1994
Partners Community HealthCare Inc. Is formed as a network of physicians, committed to enhancing the physician-patient relationship and innovation of the physician experience. In 2015, it is renamed as Partners Community Physicians Organization.
Brigham and Women's Hospital and Massachusetts General Hospital were brought together to create the Partners HealthCare health system.
1993
Mass General researchers discover genes responsible for Huntington’s Disease, ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease), and neurofibromatosis.
1986
Neighborhood Health Plan, known today as Mass General Brigham Health Plan, was founded with a mission to redefine health insurance by increasing access to high-quality health care and partnering with customers, providers and other stakeholders to create targeted, straightforward programs.
1981
Faulker Hospital makes history by being the first to successfully transfuse a patient with “rejuvenated blood.”
1980
The MGH Institute of Health Professions officially opens, admitting its first graduate students in physical therapy and social work.
Brigham and Women’s Hospital was established as the result of a merger of three Harvard-affiliated hospitals, Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, Robert Breck Brigham Hospital and Boston Hospital for Women.
1976
Brigham and Women’s Hospital researchers launch the Nurses’ Health Study, enrolling 122,000 women in America’s first and largest women’s health study.
1970
Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, known at the time as Massachusetts Rehabilitation Hospital, was founded to provide in-patient rehabilitation care to all patients. The name Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital was confirmed in 1983.
1966
The Boston Hospital for Women was established as the result of a merger of the Free Hospital for Women and Boston Lying-in Hospital
1954
The first successful human organ transplant, a kidney transplant, is accomplished at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital. Joseph Murray, MD, receives the Nobel Prize for this work.
1931
Harvey Cushing, MD, the father of modern neurosurgery, performs his 2,000th brain surgery while serving as Chief of Surgery at Peter Brent Brigham Hospital
1926
George Minot, MD, William Murphy, MD, and George Whipple, MD, at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital discover that liver extracts cure pernicious anemia. In 1934, they share the Nobel Prize for this work.
1923
The first successful heart valve surgery in the world is performed at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital by Elliot C. Cutler, MD.
1921
Martha’s Vineyard Hospital was founded in Oak Bluffs, MA.
1914
Robert Breck Brigham Hospital was founded to serve patients with arthritis and other debilitating joint diseases.
1913
Peter Bent Brigham Hospital was founded "for the care of sick persons in indigent circumstances.”
1910
Fritz B. Talbot, MD, founded the Children’s Medical Service at Massachusetts General Hospital, nearly 90 years after the first child was admitted in 1821.
1906
Nantucket Cottage Hospital was founded in Nantucket, MA, to meet the health care needs of isolated island residents.
Wentworth-Douglass Hospital was founded in Portsmouth, NH.
1886
Cooley Dickinson Health Care was founded in Northampton, MA, to provide health care services for sick and poor members of the community.
1881
Newton-Wellesley Hospital, formerly Newton Cottage Hospital, was founded in Newton, MA, to provide health care services for sick members of the community.
1875
The Free Hospital for Women was founded “for poor women affected with diseases peculiar to their sex or in need of surgical aid.”
1846
William T.G. Morton, MD, and John Collins Warren, MD, of Mass General perform the first successful public demonstration of surgical ether anesthesia.
1832
The Boston Lying-in Hospital was founded in Boston, MA, as one of the nation's first maternity hospitals dedicated to women unable to afford in-home medical care. It is the first of Brigham and Women’s Hospital predecessor institutions.
1824
Massachusetts Eye and Ear was founded in Boston, MA, to treat patients with disorders of the eyes, ears, nose, throat, head and neck. Today, Mass Eye and Ear is a Harvard Medical School teaching hospital and leader in training physicians in ophthalmology and otolaryngology head and neck surgery.
1818
The Asylum for the Insane, a division of Mass General, opens as the first hospital in New England to treat mental illness. In 1892, it is renamed McLean Hospital, which is known today as the flagship mental health hospital of Harvard Medical School and Mass General Brigham.
1811
The Massachusetts General Hospital Bulfinch Building in Boston, MA, opened its doors for the admission of the first patient at Mass General. It is the third oldest hospital in the nation.
In its first year of operation, Mass General became the first teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School.