Academic History

The Women’s and Perinatal Pathology Division has its roots in the Boston Lying-In Hospital (pictured below), founded in 1832 by Walter Channing, and joined with the Department of Pathology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in 1975.  Its directors in the past 60 years have included Drs. Arthur Hertig, John Craig, Shirley Driscoll and currently Dr. Christopher Crum.  Alumni and faculty of the Division have made a wide range of contributions in the area of gynecologic and obstetric disease including:

    • The first detailed morphologic descriptions of early human development (Hertig) [link to PubMed citation]

    • The first classifications of trophoblastic neoplasia (Hertig, Gore, Driscoll) [link to PubMed citation]

    • Detailed descriptions and documentation of placental development (Benirschke) [link to PubMed citation]

    • The CIN classification for early cervical neoplasia (Richart) [link to PubMed citation]

    • The first association between a human papillomavirus (HPV-16) and high grade CIN (Crum) [link to PubMed citation]

    • Co-discovery of CA125 as a marker for ovarian neoplasia (Welch) [link to PubMed citation]

    • Oligonucleotide design of the first commercial (Affymetrix) human expression array (Stein)

    • Elucidation of the monoclonal nature of disseminated peritoneal leiomyomatosis (Quade) [link to PubMed citation]

    • Co-discovery of p57 as a marker for complete hydatidiform mole (Castrillon) [link to PubMed citation]

    • Characterization of the p63 gene as a marker for epithelial reserve cells, and a proposed model for the development of reserve cells in reproductive age women (Crum) [link to PubMed citation]

    • Development of diagnostic criteria for "early" complete hydatidiform moles (Redline, Genest) [link to PubMed citation]

    • The first description of somatic PTEN mutation in preclinical “latent” endometrial precancers (Mutter) [link to PubMed citation]

    • The modern EIN classification system for early endometrial neoplasia (Mutter) [link to PubMed citation]

    • The first mouse model of pelvic endometriosis and related endometrioid neoplasia (Dinulescu) [link to PubMed citation]

    • One of the first studies showing that the distal fallopian tube is the origin of most early carcinomas in BRCA+ women (Medeiros and Crum) [link to PubMed citation]

    • Molecular confirmation of the “p53 signature” as a latent precancer phase of pelvic serous carcinogenesis that predominates in the distal fallopian tube (Lee et al.) [link to PubMed citation]

    • The first study establishing that many surface serous ovarian carcinomas originate in the distal fallopian tube (Kindelberger et al.) [link to PubMed citation]

    • First description of pathologic correlates of a serous carcinogenic sequence in the distal fallopian tube (Jarboe and Crum)