Bernadine Healy Papers

Collection

Identifier: MS C 624

Abstract

Bernadine Healy (1944-2011) was a cardiologist who served as the first female director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) between 1991 and 1993. In addition to her work at Johns Hopkins University and the Cleveland Clinic, she also served as CEO of the American Red Cross and President of the American Heart Association. She is well-known for her work helping to establish equality for women in health policy and research, notably establishing the Women's Health Initiative at NIH.

Dates

Creation: 1958-2010

Extent

75.2 Linear Feet (63 boxes)

Physical Location

Materials stored onsite. History of Medicine Division. National Library of Medicine

Language of Materials

Collection materials primarily in English

Access Restrictions

Collection is restricted. Portions of the collection are restricted according to HMD's Access to Health Information of Individuals policy. Contact the Reference Staff for information regarding access. For access to the policy and application form, please visit https://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/manuscripts/phi.pdf.

Copyright and Re-use Information

Donor's copyrights were transferred to the public domain.

Privacy Information

Archives and manuscript collections may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations. Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in any collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications for which the National Library of Medicine assumes no responsibility.

Biographical Note

Bernadine Healy (1944-2011) was born in Queens, New York to Michael Healy and Violet McGrath Healy. She was one of four daughters born to the primarily blue-collar family. Dr. Healy was a gifted student who attended Vassar College, where she graduated in 1965 summa cum laude with a major in chemistry and a minor in philosophy. In June 1970, Dr. Healy earned her M.D. cum laude at Harvard Medical School. She completed her postgraduate training in internal medicine and cardiology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Throughout the course of her career as a cardiologist, health administrator, and policy maker, Dr. Healy became well-known for her advocacy of equality for women in health research and her efforts to rebrand heart disease as no longer just a "man's disease."

For two years following her training, Dr. Healy worked as a researcher at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute at NIH. In 1974, she returned to Johns Hopkins as professor of medicine. While there, Dr. Healy also undertook clinical responsibilities, directed a program in cardiovascular research, served as Director of the Coronary Care Unit, and as the Assistant Dean for post-doctoral programs and faculty development. Some of Dr. Healy's earliest contributions towards equality for women in the medical field began at Hopkins, where she organized the Mary Elizabeth Garrett Symposium on women and medicine to highlight opportunities and obstacles faced by women in the profession.

Dr. Healy's formal introduction to health policy came in 1984 when President Ronald Regan appointed her Deputy Director of the White House Office of Science and Policy. Soon after, Dr. Healy was appointed chair of the Research Institute at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation in 1985 where she directed the research programs of nine different departments. Her achievements at the Cleveland Clinic include establishing new research programs, most notably to study molecular biology. Dr. Healy also participated in many large research programs including an NIH-funded program to study hypertension and another to investigate coronary artery bypass graft surgery.

While at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, Dr. Healy also served as president of the American Heart Association for 1988-1989. In her role as president, Dr. Healy furthered her cause for health research equality by initiating programs to study heart disease in women and by heading up a women's minority leadership task force.

Dr. Healy left the Cleveland Clinic in 1991 when President George H.W. Bush nominated her to be Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH); in April Dr. Healy was sworn in as NIH's first female Director. In her time at NIH she furthered the cause of equality in medicine, mandating that both men and women were included in clinical trials. Dr. Healy also launched the Women's Health Initiative, a $625 million-dollar effort to combat the lack of research on postmenopausal women's health and to seek causes, prevention, and cures of diseases affecting middle aged women. Dr. Healy was also instrumental in opening intramural laboratories for the Human Genome Project and ensured clinical trials conducted through the project studied both men and women when conditions affected both sexes. She also led the development of NIH's first strategic plan. Dr. Healy resigned from the NIH in June 1993.

After leaving NIH Dr. Healy returned to Ohio and took up a new post as Senior Policy Advisor for the Page Center for Health and Science Policy at the Cleveland Clinic. That summer she also began planning for a potential career in politics and in September 1993 announced her candidacy for the Republican nomination in Ohio's Senate race. Dr. Healy did not win the May 1994 primary, coming in second place to former Ohio governor Mike DeWine. Shortly after losing the primary election Dr. Healy left the Cleveland Clinic to serve as Dean of the Ohio State University School of Medicine, a role she held between 1995-1999.

In 1999 Dr. Healy was hired to be President and CEO of the American Red Cross. There Dr. Healy led an initiative for a strategic and safe blood reserve amidst concerns about contaminations from variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD). While at the Red Cross, Dr. Healy also became a passionate advocate for the recognition of the Israeli disaster response organization David Magen Adom by the International Red Cross. Notably, Dr. Healy led the Red Cross during the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. She presided over the creation of the Liberty Fund fundraising effort for victim's families, the alleged mishandling of which would eventually force Dr. Healy's resignation in December 2001.

Dr. Healy was also a widely sought-after health commentator, most notably as a medical consultant for many news agencies including CBS, PBS, and MSNBC, and as health editor for U.S. News & World Report where she authored a column "On Health" beginning in 2003. She was also a prolific writer, authoring over 200 academic research articles on cardiology and health policy and two published books.

Dr. Healy was involved in medical policy-making through in a variety of advisory roles. She was a member of the advisory committee to the NIH Director, the White House Science Council, the U.S. Congress's Office of Technology Assessment, the President's Council of Advisers on Science and Technology (PCAST), the Office of Technology Assessment, and as an advisor on bioterrorism to President George W. Bush.

Dr. Healy died at her home in Gates Mills, Ohio on August 6, 2011 after a thirteen year battle with brain cancer.

Collection Summary

Correspondence, subject files, briefing materials, speeches and presentations, published and draft writings, committee meeting minutes, reports, publicity, and audiovisual and photographic materials which chronicle the professional career of cardiologist and health administrator Dr. Bernadine Healy.

A small amount of personal records comprises Series 1, consisting of calendars, family material, and information on Dr. Healy's education, awards and acknowledgements, and personal correspondence. Dr. Healy often received and wrote personal correspondence from her various professional offices. As such, additional personal correspondence may be found mixed within Series 2 through 6.

The NIH Directorship series (Series 2) comprises the bulk of the collection. It consists primarily of correspondence, briefing packets, meeting minutes, reports, and speech materials documenting Dr. Healy's appointment and service as Director of the National Institutes of Health. The series contains information regarding Dr. Healy's role establishing the Women's Health Initiative and drafting the organizations first strategic plan. Other notable topics documented in the correspondence, briefings, and media subseries include the NIH's fetal tissue ban, scientific misconduct, and allegations of sexism at NIH. Briefings, minutes, and notes pertaining to the Human Genome Project, which involved conflict between Dr. Healy and the project's head researcher James D. Watson over gene-patenting, can be found in the briefings and meetings subseries which is organized strictly chronologically. Video recordings of interviews and news stories pertaining to Dr. Healy's role as Director can be found in Series 11 (Audiovisual Materials).

The third series (Cleveland Clinic) contains correspondence, presentations, and reports pertaining to Dr. Healy's role as Chairman of the Cleveland Clinic's Research Institute. While the bulk of the correspondence is arranged alphabetically, Dr. Healy maintained name files on some individuals. These name files contain both correspondence, newspaper clippings, and other related documents related to that person. Because Dr. Healy also served as President of the American Heart Association while at the Cleveland Clinic, there is some overlap, especially in correspondence, between this series and Series 4 (AHA Presidency). The series contains correspondence and annotations from Kathleen J. Vaughn (Kathy), Dr. Healy's secretary, as well as Christine Kassuba, Dr. Healy's editorial assistant. One subseries, grants and funding, is restricted. The phone logs found in the office administration subseries often contain patient names and are restricted according to HMD's PHI policy.

Series 4 (American Red Cross Presidency) contains primarily correspondence, reports, and media related to Dr. Healy's role as President and CEO of the American Red Cross from September 1999 to December 2001. Notable topics addressed are the Red Cross's blood supply policy decisions after outbreaks of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, Dr. Healy's support for recognition of the Israeli David Magen Adom disaster response organization, as well as the Red Cross' response to the September 11 attacks and controversy surrounding handling of Liberty Fund donation monies. Video recordings of interviews and news stories pertaining to Dr. Healy's role as President and CEO of the American Red Cross, specifically relating to the blood supply and the response to the September 11 attacks, can be found in Series 11 (Audiovisual Materials).

Series 7 (Professional Activities) contains correspondence, notes, publications, and other documents relating to Dr. Healy's many professional activities and affiliations she held in addition to her major positions. Notable affiliations include the American College of Cardiology, the Harvard Board of Overseers, the Institute of Medicine, the NIH Advisory Committee to the Director, the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the Ohio Council on Research and Economic Development, and U.S. News & World Report, among others. The series is organized alphabetically by organization title.

Many of Dr. Healy's speeches and presentations can be found in series nine. The series contains reading copies, drafts, slides, correspondence, and other supporting material for speeches and presentations which she gave over the course of her career. Importantly, speeches given by Dr. Healy at NIH, the Cleveland Clinic, and the American Red Cross can be found in Series 2, Series 3, and Series 4, respectively.

The bulk of Dr. Healy's writings are found in Series 10 (Writings and Publications), which contains reprints, manuscripts and drafts, correspondence, photographs, copyright agreements, and additional supporting documents relating to Dr. Healy's published and unpublished writings. The series is organized into six subseries, the first four of which are based on the publications section of Dr. Healy's CV: Books, Peer-Reviewed Journals, Science and Health Policy Articles, and Book Chapters. The publications list found at the beginning of the series serves as an index to these first four subseries, which are organized chronologically by publication date and numbered as they are in the publications list. The last two subseries, Newspapers and Magazines, and Additional Writings and Drafts, contain copies of articles which Dr. Healy wrote for newspapers and magazines. Especially notable are copies of many of the columns she wrote as U.S. News & World Report's Health Editor. Most of Dr. Healy's earliest writings were published under her first married name: Dr. Bernadine Bulkley.