William P. Cheshire, Jr., MD, MA, FAAN, is Professor of Neurology at the Mayo Clinic in Florida,* where he chairs the Ethics Committee and leads the Program in Professionalism & Values. His expertise encompasses disorders of the autonomic nervous system and neuroethics. He is Senior Fellow for The Center for Bioethics & Human Dignity.
Following an AB cum laude in biochemistry from Princeton University, he received his MD from West Virginia University and his MA in bioethics summa cum laude from Trinity International University. He completed a residency in neurology and a fellowship in pain management at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill and is board certified in Neurology.
Dr. Cheshire is president of the American Autonomic Society, past Chair of the Autonomic Nervous System Section of the American Academy of Neurology, a member of the American Neurological Association, the Neuroethics Society, and the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities. He is also a member of the Ethics Committee of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations and an Adjunct Professor of Bioethics at Trinity International University. He has been a Visiting Professor of Bioethics at Covenant Theological Seminary and the A. Kurt Weiss lecturer in biomedical ethics at the University of Oklahoma. At Mayo Clinic in Florida he was president of the staff in 2014, and in 2015 he received the Neurology Department's teacher of the year award. Author of more than one hundred peer-reviewed publications in neuroscience and bioethics, his interests include the ethical questions concerning the enhancement of normal cognitive capacity and the implications of emerging technologies for medicine. Dr. Cheshire contributes a regular feature to the international journal Ethics & Medicine entitled Grey Matters.
Dr. Cheshire was a Senior Fellow of CBHD's Academy of Fellows from 2011-2021.
Updated February 2017
* For identification purposes only; does not imply institutional support.