Kearsley A. Stewart, PhD
Professor of the Practice of Global Health & Cultural Anthropology
Kearsley A. Stewart, Ph.D., is Professor of the Practice at Duke University with joint appointments in Global Health and Cultural Anthropology. She is a faculty associate with the Trent Center for Bioethics, Humanities and History of Medicine and the Duke Science & Society program, and is Co-Director of the Duke Health Humanities Lab. She also co-directs the DGHI-Kalangala Health Center IV (KHCIV) sickle cell research and teaching collaboration in Uganda. A variety of Duke students have conducted sickle cell research at KHCIV, including third year Duke medical students, Duke Masters of Global Health students and Duke undergraduates.
Stewart’s current research interests include community-engaged sickle cell disease research in Africa and Jamaica, rapid point-of-care diagnostic sickle cell testing, capacity building for sickle cell newborn screening, the ethics of genetic testing and counseling in low resource settings, global health pedagogy, and global health humanities. Stewart joined the Hubert-Yeargan Center in 2024 to collaborate on laboratory capacity building in rural Uganda. Her work is published in The Lancet, Academic Medicine, Journal of Bioethical Inquiry, AMA Journal of Ethics, Global Public Health, Critical Stages, Africa Today, and Asian Bioethics Review among other journals.
Stewart earned her undergraduate degree at Northwestern University, her Masters degree at the University of California, Los Angeles and her PhD at the University of Florida. She completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship at Harvard’s Center for Population and Development Studies and was employed at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as an HIV/AIDS behavioral scientist. She implemented the first voluntary HIV rapid testing and counseling clinic in a rural area of Uganda and spearheaded changes in national HIV testing policies.