Carla Keirns, MD, PhD, MSc

Director of the Program on the History of Medicine
Co-Chair of the Institutional Ethics Committee
Assistant Professor
Department of Preventive Medicine
Department of Medicine

Clinical Ethics
History of Medicine
Sociology of Medicine
Health Services Research

e-mail: carla.keirns@stonybrook.edu

Carla Keirns is Assistant Professor of Preventive Medicine, Assistant Professor of Medicine and Clinical Ethicist at Stony Brook University. She graduated from Cornell University (BA, Genetics and Development), the University of Pennsylvania (MD, PhD in History & Sociology of Science), and the University of Michigan (MS, Health & Health Care Research); completed a residency in internal medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and a postdoctoral fellowship in health services research at the University of Michigan through the Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Program.

Carla joined the faculty at Stony Brook University in July 2009 where she contributes to the ethics consultation service at University Hospital, teaches medical humanities and preventive medicine to medical students, and serves as an Attending Physician in General Internal Medicine. She has authored articles and book chapters in clinical ethics, health services research, and history of medicine, with a focus on health disparities, chronic disease, epidemiologic transitions and public health ethics. She was co-curator to the National Library of Medicine’s exhibition, “Breath of Life” on the history of asthma and is completing a book, Measured Breath: A Short History of Asthma, for Johns Hopkins University Press.

Among Carla's honors are fellowships and awards from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the National Center for Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIH), the Dewitt Stetten Jr. Museum of Medical Research and the NIH Office of History, the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIH), the Woodrow Wilson National Foundation (Johnson & Johnson Fellowship), the Benjamin & Mary Siddons Measey Foundation, the Charles Redd Center for Western Studies, the Chemical Heritage Foundation, and the College of Physicians of Philadelphia. She has worked in health care settings in the United States, Australia, Mexico and Botswana, and taught public health in Jamaica.

Breath of Life: Asthma in Historical Perspective, National Library of Medicine, Bethesda, Maryland, Open in Bethesda March 1999 to March 2001, Co-Curator with Dr. Robert Aronowitz, published by NHLBI as a DVD, Online at: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/breath/breathhome.html

Keirns, Carla C. Measured Breath: A Short History of Asthma, book on the history and sociology of asthma in the United States from 1850s to the 21st century, under contract after peer review, Johns Hopkins University Press

Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles
 Keirns, Carla C. & Susan D. Goold, “Dirty Blood: Dialysis, Prognosis and Consent.” Hastings Center Reports (forthcoming)

Delisser, Horace M., Carla C. Keirns, Esther A. Clinton & Mitchell L. Margolis, “The Air Got to It”: Exploring a Belief about Surgery for Lung Cancer, Journal of the National Medical Association Journal of the National Medical Association, August 2009; 101(8): 765-771

Keirns, Carla C. “Asthma Mitigation Strategies of Professional, Charitable and Community-Based Coalitions,” American Journal of Preventive Medicine (forthcoming, November, 2009)

Dorn, Michael L., Novella Zett Keith & Carla C. Keirns, “Crossing the Divide through Edu-Tourism: A North-South Partnership in Community-Based Learning,” Caribbean Geographer (forthcoming)

Newton, Manya F., Carla C. Keirns, Rebecca Cunningham, Rodney Hayward, Rachel Stanley, “Uninsured Adults Presenting to US Emergency Departments: Assumptions vs Data" JAMA, October 22/29, 2008; 300: 1914 - 1924.

DeVries, Raymond & Carla C. Keirns, “Does Money Make Bioethics Go ‘Round?” American Journal of Bioethics, August 2008; 8(8): 65-67.

Keirns, Carla C. & Brendan Carr, “From the Emergency Department to Vital Statistics: Cause of Death Uncertain,” Academic Emergency Medicine, August 2008; 15(8) 768-775.

Keirns, Carla C. & Charles L. Bosk, “The Unintended Consequences of Training Residents in Dysfunctional Outpatient Settings,” Academic Medicine, May 2008; 83(5): 498-502.

Book Chapters
Dorn, Michael L. Carla C. Keirns & Vincent Del Casino, “Doubting Dualisms: A Genealogical Reading of Medical Geographies,” in Companion to Health and Medical Geography, edited by Tim Brown, Sara McLafferty, & Graham Moon, Boston: Blackwell pp. 55-78.

Keirns, Carla C., Michael Fetters, Raymond De Vries, “Bioethics & Medical Education,” in Handbook of the Sociology of Medical Education, edited by Caragh Brosnan and Bryan S. Turner, London: Routledge, 2009, pp. 174-190.

Dorn, Michael L. and Carla C. Keirns, “Disability, Health, Nation,” in Handbook of Social Geography, Smith, S., S. Marston, R. Pain and J. P. Jones III, eds. London: Sage Books, 2009, pp.99-117.

Keirns, Carla C. “Germs, Vaccines, and the Rise of Allergy,” Crafting Immunity, edited by Kenton Kroker, Pauline Mazumdar, and Jennifer Keelan, Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2008, pp. 77-103.

Keirns, Carla C. “Susan and the Simmonds-Sheehan Syndrome,” in Clio in the Clinic: History in Medical Practice, edited by Jacalyn Duffin, Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press; Toronto and London: University of Toronto Press, 2005, pp. 116-127.

Essays
 Keirns, Carla C. “Dying of a Treatable Disease,” Health Affairs (forthcoming)

Keirns, Carla C. “Doctors and Divination,” Academic Medicine, July 2008, 83(7): 652.

Keirns, Carla C. “What if it were your father?” Canadian Journal of Emergency Medicine, May 2007, 9(3): 180-181.