Dr. Daniel Wolpaw, professor of medicine and humanities, has been appointed director of The Doctors Kienle Center for Humanistic Medicine at Penn State College of Medicine, effective Aug. 15.
Originally established as the Center for Humanistic Medicine in 1979 and renamed The Doctors Kienle Center in 1991, this center supports education and research aimed at promoting a humane, compassionate and patient-centered approach to medicine. The center is named in honor of Dr. Lawrence F. Kienle and the late Dr. Jane Witmer Kienle, whose generous support has been vital in advancing the center’s mission.
For the past seven years, the Kienle Center has been led by Dr. Philip Wilson, professor of humanities. Wilson will be leaving the College of Medicine in August to become chair of the department of history at East Tennessee State University. Wolpaw is a lifelong medical educator with a passion for the humanities and has agreed to take on the task of leading the center following Wilson’s departure.
Wolpaw joined Penn State Hershey in January after three decades on the faculty at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. Board certified in internal medicine and emergency medicine, he earned his doctorate of medicine at Case Western after receiving his undergraduate education at Amherst College; he completed a residency in family medicine at the Medical University of South Carolina following his internal medicine internship at Cleveland Metropolitan General Hospital. Wolpaw has published extensively in journals such as Academic Medicine, Medical Education and the New England Journal of Medicine and has served on the faculty for the Harvard-Macy Program for Educators in the Health Professions. A member of Alpha Omega Alpha and the Gold Humanism Honor Society, he is frequently invited to speak at national and international meetings on medical education.