Patricia A. Buffler, Ph.D., M.P.H.

Recruitment and Screening Panel

Patricia A. Buffler is Professor of Epidemiology and Dean Emerita at the University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health where she served as Dean from 1991-1998. She was recently appointed to the Kenneth and Marjorie Kaiser Endowed Chair and her current research interests in cancer epidemiology include studies of leukemia and brain tumors in children, health effects of environmental second-hand tobacco smoke and health effects of non-ionizing radiation. Dr. Buffler has held academic positions at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston where she was a professor of epidemiology from 1980-1991 and served as the Director of both the Epidemiology Research Unit (1980-1991) and the Southwest Center for Occupational Health and Safety Educational Research Center, at UTHSC and Texas A&M University (1988-1991). She has also served as the principal and co-principal investigator for over three dozen research activities including recently funded research by the National Institutes of Health Toxic Substances in the Environment Research Program and National Institutes of Health for studies of Molecular Epidemiology of Childhood Leukemia and Environmental Exposures and Leukemia. As well as having served on several editorial boards, Dr. Buffler also holds several memberships in scientific societies and professional organizations and has served on numerous national and international advisory groups including advisory committees to the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Office of the President of the University of California , the National Research Council, and the World Health Organization. Dr. Buffler has served as President of the Society of Epidemiologic Research, the American College of Epidemiology, and the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology and is currently an officer of the Medical Sciences Council of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She is currently a member of the National Advisory Council to the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences, the Board of Scientific Counselors for the CDC National Center for Infectious Diseases and the federal Task Force on Community-Based Public Health Interventions. Dr. Buffler was awarded the James D. Bruce Award in Preventive Medicine from the American College of Physicians in 1999 and the American College of Epidemiology Lilienfield Award in 1996. She is a Fellow of both the American College of Epidemiology and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and a member of the Institute of Medicine/National Academy of Sciences. Dr. Buffler received her BSN in Nursing and Biology from Catholic University of America in 1960 before receiving her MPH in Public Health Administration and Epidemiology in 1965 and her doctorate in 1973 at the University of California, Berkeley. She has served as a dirrector or member of several boards including the U.S.-Japan Radiation Effects Research Foundation, the national Urban Air Toxics Research Center, the Lovelace Respiratory Research Institute, the FMC Corporation and the National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements.