2014 Bioethics Lecture

Am I My Genes?:

Confronting Fate and Family Secrets

in the Age of Genetic Testing

Robert Klitzman, MD

Professor of Psychiatry

Director, Masters of Bioethics Program

College of Physicians and Surgeons

Joseph Mailman School of Public Health

Columbia University

Dr. Klitzman will explore several critical clinical, psychological, social, ethical and legal challenges posed by increasing understanding and use of genetic and genomic tests.  These tests can aid in the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of numerous diseases, but also pose a series of questions: how do we understand the possibility that genes might affect key aspects of ourselves and of our diseases; who should be tested and when; to which family members should patients disclose test results whether patients should share results to friends, employers or others; how tests might alter how we look at these diseases and individuals, and how we understand causality, responsibility and fate.

Dr. Robert Klitzman is a Professor of Psychiatry in the College of Physicians and Surgeons and the Joseph Mailman School of Public Health and the Director of the Masters of Bioethics Program at Columbia University. He co-founded and for five years co-directed the Center for Bioethics, and has been Director of the Ethics and Policy Core of the HIV Center.  He has conducted research and written about a variety of ethical issues in medicine and public. He has written eight books, and authored or co-authored over 100 articles and chapters, drawing on qualitative as well as quantitative methodologies. His work has appeared in JAMA, Science, and elsewhere, and he has written for the New York Times, Newsweek, The Nation, and other publications.  His books include Am I My Genes?:  Confronting Fate and Family Secrets in the Age of Genetic Testing, When Doctors Become Patients, A Year-long Night:  Tales of a Medical Internship, In a House of Dreams and Glass:  Becoming a Psychiatrist, Being Positive:  The Lives of Men and Women with HIV, The Trembling Mountain: A Personal Account of Kuru, Cannibals and Mad Cow Disease, and Mortal Secrets:  Truth and Lies in the Age of AIDS.  He has received several awards for his work, including fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, the Aaron Diamond Foundation, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Commonwealth Fund, and the Hastings Center.  He is a gubernatorial appointee to the NY State Stem Cell Commission, and is member of the Research Ethics Advisory Panel of the US Department of Defense.

This activity has been planned and implemented in accordance with the accreditation requirements and policies of the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education through the joint providership of the Medical College of Wisconsin and Milwaukee Academy of Medicine. The Medical College of Wisconsin is accredited by the ACCME to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

The Medical College of Wisconsin designates this live activity for a maximum of 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.