Coleen Kivlahan, MD, MSPH

Coleen Kivlahan MD, MSPH is a family medicine physician and an experienced international expert and trainer in forensic medical evaluations of torture, ill-treatment and human rights violations. She serves as Chair of the UCSF Health and Human Rights Initiative and Co-Medical Director of the Human Rights Collaborative, providing pro-bono asylum evaluations with our medical school and legal partners. She has provided forensic medical evaluations and training with Physicians for Human Rights and currently serves as lead medical consultant for Synergy for Justice, a UK-based, women-led NGO partnered with Lawyers and Doctors for Human Rights, a Syrian NGO focused on identifying and preventing sexual violence. She has worked in conflict zones in the Middle East, Central America and Sub-Saharan Africa, providing human rights training and expert evaluations to physicians. She remains inspired to do the work of bringing more justice and goodness into our world, as a tribute to her children and grandson. Passionate about training and education, Coleen is converting the Istanbul Protocol, the international guideline for documenting human rights violations, to a standard survey format that collects critical data to inform justice actors, policy makers and clinicians.