Faculty Bio

Dr. Frank Sacks is Professor of Cardiovascular Disease Prevention, Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health. He is senior attending physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital where he has a specialty clinic in hyperlipidemia, and Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School. He is involved in research and public policy in nutrition, cholesterol disorders, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease. His research program is a combination of laboratory research on human lipoprotein metabolism, and clinical trials in nutrition and cardiovascular disease. The laboratory research concerns the acute and long‑term effects of diet on the kinetics of lipoproteins, cholesterol carrying particles, in humans. Trainees develop models of normal and abnormal lipoprotein physiology in humans and determine the interaction with dietary fat and carbohydrate. Dr Sacks is Chair of the Steering Committee for the recently completed PoundsLost trial, a 2-center NHLBI-sponsored trial that compared the effect of diets for weight loss that differed in content of carbohydrate, fat or protein. The project is in the data analysis and manuscript writing phase with current involvement and future opportunities for trainees. Dr. Sacks is also Chair of the ongoing Omni-Carb trial, a 2-center NHLBI-sponsored controlled feeding study using the model of the DASH trials that is studying the effect of type and amount of carbohydrate on insulin sensitivity, lipoprotein metabolism, and risk factors for diabetes and cardiovascular disease. This study will be completed during the term of this training award and also have major opportunities for trainees , Dr Sacks has 160 publications of original research, and over 60 reviews, editorials, and chapters.  Dr Sacks is active in national and international committees and conferences in nutrition and health guidelines. He is Vice-Chair and incoming Chair of the American Heart Association Nutrition Committee, the policy making group for nutrition at the AHA. He is a member of the new NHLBI Clinical Guidelines for Cardiovascular Risk Reduction First Expert Panel. As part of this assignment, he serves on the National Cholesterol Education Program Adult Treatment Panel IV, and the Lifestyle Intervention work group. Dr Sacks is course director at Harvard School of Public Health for The Science of Human Nutrition, a required course on nutritional biochemistry, and for Scientific Writing in Nutrition and Epidemiology, an interdepartmental elective course in the Nutrition and Epidemiology Departments.  He lectures at Harvard Medical School in nutrition science, and at Brigham & Women’s Hospital on treatment of hyperlipidemia.