Cynda H Rushton

Dr Cynda H. Rushton, PhD, RN, FAAN is the Anne and George L. Bunting Professor of Clinical Ethics and holds a joint appointment at The Johns Hopkins University Berman Institute of Bioethics and School of Nursing with an appointment in the School of Medicine (Department of Pediatrics). She is co-chair of The Johns Hopkins Hospital Ethics Consultation Service. Her scholarship focuses on moral distress, palliative care, caregiver suffering, and conceptual foundations of integrity, respect, trust and compassion.

Melissa J. Kurtz, MSN, MA, RN is a practicing nurse in the neonatal intensive care unit and a doctoral student at The Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, where her scholarship focuses on the decision-making processes of parents of children with critical illnesses. She is particularly interested in exploring how parents’ spiritual and/or religious beliefs impact their functioning in the health care environment. Ms. Kurtz completed a two-year bioethics fellowship at the Montefiore-Einstein Center for Bioethics in 2013.