Kathy Faber-Langendoen
Kathy Faber-Langendoen, MD, is the founding Chair of the Center for Bioethics and Humanities. She joined SUNY Upstate Medical University in 1998 as the Medical Alumni Endowed Professor of Bioethics. Initially, she developed the Program in Bioethics within the Department of Medicine; in 2000, she led the merger of the Program in Bioethics with the Program in Medical Humanities, forming the Center for Bioethics and Humanities. In 2006, the Center was designated as a department within the College of Medicine. She chaired the department until stepping down in 2021.
In leading the Center, Dr. Faber-Langendoen established a required, innovative case-based 3rd year bioethics course that runs in parallel with the clinical clerkships. She expanded Upstate’s Ethics Consult Service to include both of Upstate’s hospitals and Crouse Hospital. Along with colleagues, she developed programs in physician advocacy and activism and required ethics courses in all of Upstate’s colleges, and supported the development of—and continues as Associate Editor of—The Healing Muse, SUNY Upstate’s journal of literary and visual arts. Along with many others across New York, she successfully lobbied for the passage of the Family Health Care Decisions Act, giving family members surrogate decisionmaking powers absent a health care proxy.
Dr. Faber-Langendoen has a secondary appointment as Professor of Medicine. She completed her medical degree and internal medical residency at Washington University in St. Louis and completed a medical oncology fellowship at the University of Minnesota with a research focus in bioethics.
Dr. Faber-Langendoen may be reached at [email protected].
Dr. Faber-Langendoen's current CV.
Selected Publications
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Faber-Langendoen K. Case-Based Professionalism Education for Internal Medicine Residents and Fellows. In Report from a Convening of Grantees on Educating and Training to Professionalism. Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation Institute on Medicine as a Profession. 2018 July: 111-119.
Dwyer J, Faber-Langendoen K. Speaking up: an ethical action exercise. Academic Medicine. 2018 April; 93(4):602-5.
McCrary SV, Swanson JW, Coulehan J, Faber-Langendoen K, Olick RS, Belling C. Physicians' legal defensiveness in end-of-life treatment decisions: comparing attitudes and knowledge in states with different laws. J Clin Ethics. 2006 Spring;17(1):15-26.
Caldicott CV, Faber-Langendoen K. Deception, discrimination, and fear of reprisal: lessons in ethics from third-year medical students. Acad Med. 2005 Sep;80(9):866-73.
Lo B, Ruston D, Kates LW, Arnold RM, Cohen CB, Faber-Langendoen K, Pantilat SZ, Puchalski CM, Quill TR, Rabow MW, Schreiber S, Sulmasy DP, Tulsky JA, Working Group on Religious and Spiritual Issues at the End of Life. Discussing religious and spiritual issues at the end of life: a practical guide for physicians. JAMA. 2002 Feb 13;287(6):749-54.
Bartels DM, Faber-Langendoen K. Caring in crisis: Family perspectives on ventilator withdrawal at the end-of-life. Families, Systems & Health. 2001 June 13;19(2):169-76.
Faber-Langendoen K, Lanken PN. Dying patients in the intensive care unit: forgoing treatment, maintaining care. Ann Intern Med. 2000 Dec 5;133(11):886-93.
Faber-Langendoen K, Karlawish JH. Should assisted suicide be only physician assisted? Ann Intern Med. 2000 Mar 21;132(6):482-7.
Faber-Langendoen K. Death by request: assisted suicide and the oncologist. Cancer. 1998 Jan 1;82(1):35-41.
Brody H, Campbell ML, Faber-Langendoen K, Ogle KS. Withdrawing intensive life-sustaining treatment -- recommendations for compassionate clinical management. N Engl J Med. 1997 Feb 27;336(9):652-7.
Faber-Langendoen K. A multi-institutional study of care given to patients dying in hospitals. Ethical and practice implications. Arch Intern Med. 1996 Oct 14;156(18):2130-6.
Faber-Langendoen K. The clinical management of dying patients receiving mechanical ventilation. A survey of physician practice. Chest. 1994 Sep;106(3):880-8.