Staff of the Center of the History of Medicine are information resources professionals with post-graduate degrees in library and information science, museum studies, and history. Staff are active members of local and national professional organizations -- often serving in leadership positions -- and have contributed to our professions at Harvard and beyond.

We recognize that finding history of medicine resources can be daunting, especially if you have never conducted work in an archives, special collections, or museum environment. Research consultations enable us to understand the work that you are doing so that we can help you identify collections that support your area of inquiry. During a consultation, staff can also explain how to submit requests for access to restricted records if collections of interest contain them.

Contact us to schedule a research consultation with one of the Center staff listed below.

Dominic Hall, Manager, Curation and Stewardship, Anatomy and Artifact Collections
Areas of expertise:

  • American anatomical teaching museums
  • Anatomical, osteological, and wet tissue preparations
  • Legal and regular anatomical supply chain development in 19th-century Massachusetts
  • Legacy human remains collections and bioethics
  • Medical education and anatomical teaching at Harvard Medical School
  • Medical instrumentation and anatomical models
  • Warren Anatomical Museum collection
  • Phineas Gage

Jessica Murphy, Manager, Research and Instruction, Special Collections and Archives
Librarian for Harvard Medical School's Hinton Society
Areas of expertise:

  • Biosciences
  • Harvard Longwood Medical Area Internal Review Board submissions for collections access
  • History of medicine, dentistry, and public health at Harvard University

Catherine Pate, Brigham and Women's Hospital Archivist
Areas of expertise:

  • History of the Brigham and Women's Hospital and its parent hospitals
  • Boston Lying-in Hospital
  • The Free Hospital for Women
  • The Peter Bent Brigham Hospital
  • The Robert B. Brigham Hospital
  • The Boston Hospital for Women
  • The Affiliated Hospitals Center, Inc.

Scott H. Podolsky, MD, Director, Center for the History of Medicine
Professor of Global Health and Social Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Faculty Adviser, HMS Office of Scholarly Engagement
Areas of Expertise:

  • History of 19th- and 20th-century therapeutics, especially the history of antimicrobials
  • History of controlled clinical trials and attempts to establish a rational therapeutics
  • History of drug legislation and of the pharmaceutical industry
  • History of medical journals
  • History of the medical humanities
  • History of immunology