Dr. Ran Abuhasira

Ran Abuhasira is a senior physician in an internal medicine department and the head of the Clinical Research Center at Soroka University Medical Center in Beer Sheva, Israel. He received his MD degree from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, did an internship at Assuta Ashdod University Hospital, followed by a residency in Internal Medicine at the Beilinson Campus of the Rabin Medical Center in Petah-Tikva. In each place, he received awards for excellence.

During his internship and residency, Dr. Abuhasira pursued a PhD in Epidemiology at Ben-Gurion University, assessing the safety and efficacy of medical cannabis in the elderly population. His findings include the reduction of systolic and diastolic blood pressure values in older adults with hypertension, without significant metabolic alterations. He believes that the gap between the public perception of cannabis as being a 21st century panacea and the medical establishment’s view that cannabis is a 21st century snake oil should be bridged by more clinical studies with appropriate study designs.

Dr. Abuhasira’s postdoctoral research in the Division of Rheumatology, Allergy, and Immunology at Massachusetts General Hospital and in the Department of Medicine at Harvard Medical School aims to uncover the biological processes behind gout and its flares by studying proteins in the blood, which reflect genetic, environmental, and metabolic influences (proteomics analysis). He will analyze blood samples from the Nurses’ Health Study and other large health studies, integrating protein, genetic and metabolic data. He hopes to identify protein markers that predict gout risk and flares and validate these findings in diverse populations, eventually supporting personalized prevention and treatment strategies.