David John Doukas (born 4 November 1957, Washington, DC), is an American family physician and

bioethicist Bioethics is both a field of study and professional practice, interested in ethical issues related to health (primarily focused on the human, but also increasingly includes animal ethics), including those emerging from advances in biology, med ...

. He holds the James A. Knight Chair of Humanities and Ethics in Medicine, and directs the Program in Medical Ethics and Human Values at Tulane University's School of Medicine. Prof. Doukas also is the Executive Director of the Master of Science in Bioethics and Medical Humanities at Tulane University. Professor Doukas was Founding President of the Academy for Professionalism in Health Care from 2012 to 2019.

Biography

Doukas holds degrees in Biology and Religious Studies (B.A.) from the

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United S ...

and an M.D. from

Georgetown University Georgetown University is a private university, private research university in the Georgetown (Washington, D.C.), Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded by Bishop John Carroll (archbishop of Baltimore), John Carroll in 1789 as Georg ...

School of Medicine. After completing a Family Practice internship at

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...

and residency st the

University of Kentucky The University of Kentucky (UK, UKY, or U of K) is a Public University, public Land-grant University, land-grant research university in Lexington, Kentucky. Founded in 1865 by John Bryan Bowman as the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Kentu ...

, he completed a Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Bioethics (1986–87) at the Joseph and Rose

Kennedy Institute of Ethics The Kennedy Institute of Ethics (also known as Joseph and Rose Kennedy Institute of Ethics) is one of the most prestigious bioethics institutes in the world. Located at Healy Hall, it was established at Georgetown University in 1971 as a bioethi ...

of Georgetown University . He previously has served on the faculties of

(1987-1989), the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

(1989-1999), the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

(1999-2004), and as the William Ray Moore Endowed Chair of Family Medicine and Medical Humanism, the Director of the Division of Medical Humanism and Ethics, a Professor in the Department of Family and Geriatric Medicine, and co-Director of the Interdisciplinary Master of Arts in Bioethics Program at the

University of Louisville The University of Louisville (UofL) is a public research university in Louisville, Kentucky. It is part of the Kentucky state university system. When founded in 1798, it was the first city-owned public university in the United States and one of ...

(2004-2017). He joined the faculty of the Tulane University's School of Medicine in December of 2017.

Professional work

His scholarship focuses on the areas of

professionalism A professional is a member of a profession or any person who works in a specified professional activity. The term also describes the standards of education and training that prepare members of the profession with the particular knowledge and skil ...

, primary care

bioethics Bioethics is both a field of study and professional practice, interested in ethical issues related to health (primarily focused on the human, but also increasingly includes animal ethics), including those emerging from advances in biology, med ...

genetics Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinian friar wor ...

, and

end-of-life care End-of-life care (EoLC) refers to health care provided in the time leading up to a person's death. End-of-life care can be provided in the hours, days, or months before a person dies and encompasses care and support for a person's mental and emotio ...

decision-making. He is the originator of the concept termed the family covenant (1991), a health care agreement between a health provider and entire family that sets out to address proactively issues revolving around individual and family claims to medical information. Doukas and others subsequently applied the family covenant to genetic and end-of-life ethical circumstances. He is the co-developer and author of the Values History (1988) with LB McCullough as a method for eliciting the values and advance directives of patients toward life-prolonging care, that has been widely cited as a valuable means to enhance the process of identifying relevant patient values important in end-of-life care decision-making. He co-authored the book, ''Planning for Uncertainty'' (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993, 2nd edition 2007) with William Reichel, M.D., which examines the evaluation of patient values and their relevance to advance directive selection. According to

WorldCat WorldCat is a union catalog that itemizes the collections of tens of thousands of institutions (mostly libraries), in many countries, that are current or past members of the OCLC global cooperative. It is operated by OCLC, Inc. Many of the OCL ...

, the book's two editions are held in 1031 libraries. WorldCat author listing
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References

External links

Program in Medical Ethics and Human Values Website at Tulane University School of MedicinePersonal Web Page at Tulane UniversityMS in Bioethics and Medical Humanities, Tulane University
{{DEFAULTSORT:Doukas, David John 1957 births Living people American primary care physicians Bioethicists University of Louisville faculty Georgetown University School of Medicine alumni University of Virginia alumni