Richie named fellow of Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity
Dr. Cristina Richie (Contributed photo)
Dr. Cristina Richie, an assistant professor in the Department of Bioethics and Interdisciplinary Studies at the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University, has accepted an invitation to join the Academy of Fellows at the Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity (CBHD) at Trinity International University in Deerfield, Ill.
The Academy of Fellows is a community of scholars in bioethics focused on thoughtful discussion, charitable engagement and mutual support. Richie will join more than 30 widely recognized international and national biomedical scholars – including Gilbert Meilaender; Daniel Sulmasy; president of her alma mater, Dennis P. Hollinger; and emeritus fellows H. Tristram Engelhardt Jr. and Edmund Pellegrino – for a three-year term as an associate fellow.
“The opportunity to join the Academy of Fellows is an honor,” Richie said. “To be counted among so many great minds will facilitate my professional dedication to educational excellence, scholastic innovation and health care justice.”
During her term, Richie will continue her work on environmental sustainability in health care, assisted reproductive technologies and global justice. She will participate in annual research consultations at Trinity University, present her scholarship at the CBHD and other professional conferences and offer commentary on current issues and development in bioethics.
Richie’s tenure with the academy will coincide with her leadership position as co-chair of the Bioethics Consultation of the Evangelical Theological Society (2019–2021), where she has served as a member of the steering committee since 2015.
Richie joined the Brody faculty in 2017. She teaches in the first-year ethics course and delivers the third-year OB-GYN clerkship ethics lecture. She also teaches ethics across ECU’s Division of Health Sciences and provides clinical ethics consultations through the Bioethics Collaborative, a partnership between Brody and Vidant Medical Center.
Prior to joining the faculty at ECU, Richie taught health care ethics at Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences in Boston; bioethics at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts; and medical ethics at Zaporozhye Bible College and Seminary in Ukraine. She is the author of the forthcoming “Principles of Green Bioethics: Sustainability in Health Care” (Michigan State University Press).
Richie serves as head of the North Carolina United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Bioethics Unit. According to their website, UNESCO “promotes international cooperation among its 193 Member States and six Associate Members in the fields of education, science, culture and communication.”
-Spaine Stephens, University Communications