| J. Andrew Billings, MD Assistant Clinical Professor of Medicine Co-Director, Harvard Medical School Center for Palliative Care Director, Palliative Care Service Massachusetts General Hospital Founders 600, 55 Fruit Street Boston , MA 02114 -2696 Phone: 617.724.9197 Fax: 617.724.2693 E-mail: jbillings@partners.org |
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Educational and professional experience: |
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| 1967 | Amherst College, B.A. | ||
| 1972 | Harvard Medical School, M.D. | ||
| 1972-1973 | Straight Medical Intern, San Francisco General Hospital, San Francisco | ||
| 1973-75 | Medical Resident and Elective Fellowship in Psychosomatic Medicine, U. of CA Hospitals, San Francisco | ||
| 1975-1977 | Fellow in Adult Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston | ||
| 1975-1995 | Staff Physician, MGH Chelsea Memorial Health Center | ||
| since 1977 | Staff Physician at MGH | ||
| 1995-present | Director, Palliative Care Service, MGH | ||
I was born and raised in Los Angeles. In medical school, I liked outpatientmedicine best since I could talk with patients, enjoy longitudinal relationships, and provide comprehensive care. After housestaff training, I joined an MGH-affiliated community-based practice in a poor, multi-ethnic community, and quickly took up two medical hobbies: teaching the clinical interview and home care. The communication teaching was later fortified by my participation during the 1980’s in design and execution of the New Pathway Clinical Skills and Patient-Doctor curriculum. The home care evolved into being a medical director for home hospice programs, beginning in the later 1970’s, and led me to develop expertise in end-of-life care and publish an early textbook on the subject. I participated in the national and international movements to upgrade medical care for dying persons and their families. I was married in 1983 to Susan Block, an internist/psychiatrist/educator who is now at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, also doing palliative care. Two sons, ages 15 and 17, think we are morbid.
My teaching now focuses almost exclusively on end-of-life care and especially oncommunication issues. I co-direct a first-year medical school elective, Living with Life Threatening Illness, which uses student visits to patient-instructors over a 3 month period as the main “text,” combined with weekly small group discussions. I also direct “MGH cares about Pain Relief,” a hospital-wide initiative to improve pain assessment and management. After piloting a series of National Cancer Institute –sponsored Palliative Care Role Model program, we created the Harvard Medical School Center for Palliative Care with the sponsorship of Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
