Professor Elizabeth Pendo Awarded a Greenwall Foundation Grant As Part of Collaborative Team With the Bioethics Research Center

08/15/2019

The Greenwall Foundation has awarded the grant to support an innovative team project focused on the disciplinary practices of State Medical Boards (SMBs).

SMBs are tasked with protecting the public by ensuring that physicians are competent and adhere to appropriate standards of care and ethical guidelines. At present, SMBs across the country discipline physicians at widely varying rates, and studies of cases of serious ethical violations by physicians- such as sexual assault – found that offending physicians frequently continued to practice medicine and commit violations even after being referred to SMBs.

The grant funded by the Greenwall Foundation seeks solutions to this serious problem. It aims to identify promising practices and essential resources for SMBs and to understand barriers to removing physicians from practice in a timely manner when necessary to protect patients. It also proposes to generate resources intended to help SMBs, legislators, and others assess and improve SMB operations.

“Through this project, we seek to identify laws, policies and practices that SMBs can use to effectively address serious physician misconduct and protect patients. We believe that working with members of SMBs is the best way to find legal and policy solutions that can work and to increase the likelihood that they will be adopted.”

Professor Pendo brings her expertise in health care law and policy, legal issues in bioethics, and disability law to the team. The research will be conducted through Washington University in St. Louis’ Bioethics Research Center. The team will be led by Tristan McIntosh, PhD alongside James DuBois, DSc, PhD.