J. Andrew Billings, MD

Associate Professor of Medicine and
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: 617-724-8693

Educational and professional experience:

Amherst College, B.A., 1967
Harvard Medical School, M.D., 1972
Straight Medical Intern, San Francisco General Hospital, San Francisco 1972-1973
Medical Resident and Elective Fellowship in Psychosomatic Medicine, U. of CA Hospitals, 1973-75 Fellow in Adult Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, 1975-1977
Staff physician, MGH Chelsea Memorial Health Center, 1975-1995,
and staff physician at MGH since 1977
Director, Palliative Care Service, MGH, 1995-present

Current teaching and research interests:

My teaching now focuses almost exclusively on end-of-life care and especially on communication 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 programs, we created the Harvard Medical School Center for Palliative Care with the sponsorship of Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

If you have additional questions, please contact us via e-mail at: pallcare@partners.org .