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Matthew Perry Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital team up to fight addiction

Matthew Perry Foundation, Mass. General team up to fight addiction
Matthew Perry Foundation, Mass. General team up to fight addiction 02:05

BOSTON - The Matthew Perry Foundation, which carries on the legacy of the actor best known for his role on "Friends," is partnering with a hospital in Boston to fight addiction.

Massachusetts General Hospital on Tuesday announced the creation of the "Matthew Perry Foundation Fellowship in Addiction Medicine." 

The inaugural fellow is Dr. Sarah "SK" Kler, who will join an exclusive program that helps physicians "become specialists and leaders in Addiction Medicine," the hospital said.

"The Matthew Perry Foundation is honored to be in partnership with Massachusetts General Hospital's Addiction Medicine Fellowship program," the foundation said in a statement. "Matthew believed deeply in eliminating the stigma surrounding the disease of addiction and, with that in mind, we are proud to lend our name to this important work."

Matthew Perry's struggle with addiction

Perry, who played Chandler Bing on the long-running sitcom, died from "the acute effects of ketamine," an autopsy found, after he was found dead in a jacuzzi at his home in Oct. 2023. 

In a best-selling memoir published the year before his death, Perry opened up about his struggle with addiction. He wrote that at one point he was taking 55 Vicodin a day while "Friends" was on TV, and "I couldn't stop because the disease and the addiction is progressive."

"My hope is that people will relate to it, and know that this disease attacks everybody," Perry told People magazine. "It doesn't matter if you're successful or not successful, the disease doesn't care."

Addiction a "pressing problem" in New England

MGH said about 50 million Americans struggle with addiction, and hundreds of thousands die every year from alcohol and drugs.

Fellowship program director Dr. Sarah Wakeman, the senior medical director for substance use disorder at Mass General Brigham, said it's important to incorporate addiction treatment with the rest of medical care.

"Addiction is a pressing, pressing problem in new England," Wakeman told WBZ-TV. "One study estimated that 4.6% of Massachusetts adults have an opioid use disorder. So that's huge. We see literally thousands of cases in one hospital alone, in our primary care practices and our emergency departments, so there is always a need."

Wakeman said that in many cases there simply aren't enough resources to treat the amount of patients dealing with addiction.

"Unlike the volume of cardiologists or cancer specialists across the country, there really are limited people who specialize in this space," she said. "So to have a foundation with Matthew Perry's name on it and his legacy to honor and to partner with is really a tremendously big deal."

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