Gradie R. Rowntree, M.D. and Mary D. Rowntree Chair in Family Practice
School of Medicine
Diane M. Harper, M.D., M.P.H., M.S., professor and chair of the Department of Family and Geriatric Medicine, joined UofL in 2013. She also holds joint appointments in the Departments of Obstetrics and Gynecology in the School of Medicine, Bioengineering in the Speed School of Engineering, and Epidemiology and Population Health and Health Promotion and Behavioral Health Sciences in the School of Public Health and Information Sciences.
Dr. Harper earned a bachelor of science degree in chemical engineering and a master of science in polymerics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. She earned her medical degree and master of public health degree from the University of Kansas School of Medicine in Kansas City, where she also completed residencies in both obstetrics and gynecology and family medicine. She is board certified by, and a Fellow of, the American Academy of Family Practice and is an associate member of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Her many fellowships include a Cancer Control Career Development Fellowship from the American Cancer Society, the United States Public Health Service Primary Care Fellowship, a Robert Wood Johnson Generalist Physician Faculty Fellowship, a fellowship in the Stanford University Faculty Development Program for Medical Decision Making and a fellowship with the Inter-Institutes Genetics Clinic of the National Institutes of Health.
Dr. Harper’s primary research focus is the prevention of diseases caused by the Human Papillomavirus, with more than 140 peer-reviewed published works on the subject to her credit. She has served as an advisor to the World Health Organization and the Pan American Health Organization on HPV-associated cancer prevention for the past 15 years, offering plenary sessions with the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC). She reviews research grants at the federal level for NCI, PCORI, AHRQ and the European Commission on Research, in addition to the Wellcome Trust of the UK; the Medical Research Council of South Africa; the KWF Kankerbestrijding (Dutch Cancer Society); the WWTF (Wiener Wissenschafts-, Forschungs- und Technologigefonds); Vienna Science and Technology Fund, Austria; the Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bengladesh; and the US Military Vaccine Agency.