Mark P. Pfeifer

Mark P. Pfeifer, M.D. is professor of medicine and V.V. Cooke Endowed Chair in Medicine, University of Louisville School of Medicine and Chief Medical Officer of U of L Healthcare.

Dr. Pfeifer has twenty years experience in efforts to improve end-of-life care, stemming from fellowship work at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill that included multi-centered studies on end-of-life communication and planning.

He has served, or is serving, as a principal investigator on National Institutes of Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and foundation sponsored research and demonstration projects related to palliative medicine.

He has significant experience designing, carrying out, and evaluating complex studies in this field.

In addition, Dr. Pfeifer leads an interdisciplinary team around palliative medicine education, research, and clinical programs that has widely partnered with community organizations including, but not limited to, hospices, managed care plans, cancer centers, and hospitals.

Dr. Pfeifer’s current efforts include leading  a unique NIH-sponsored tele-health trial in symptom management in head and neck cancer patients, a tele-health trial in symptom management for lung cancer patients, and an NIH-sponsored education grant that will develop and test an interdisciplinary oncology palliative care curriculum for our medical, nursing, social work, chaplaincy students