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Stacey Tovino

Stacey Tovino joined the Hamline University School of Law faculty in August 2006. Dr. Tovino’s research interests lie in the areas of health care law and ethics, including neurolaw, neuroethics, and research ethics; the confidentiality and privacy of patients and human research subjects; the history of medicine, including the history of psychiatry, neuroscience, neuroimaging, mental health care, and midwifery; and literature and narrative studies in health care. At Hamline, Dr. Tovino teaches HIPAA Privacy, Mental Health Law, Law and Bioethics, Patients' Rights, Complementary and Alternative Medicine and the Law, Comparative Health Law, Health Care Quality and Liability, and Elder Law. Dr. Tovino most recently served as Visiting Professor at the University of Houston Law Center’s Health Law & Policy Institute, where she taught Health Law, Health Privacy, and Torts.

Dr. Tovino earned her Ph.D. in medical humanities with distinction from the University of Texas Medical Branch, Institute for the Medical Humanities, where she specialized in health care ethics, the history of medicine, and literature and narrative studies in health care. During graduate school, Dr. Tovino was elected to Phi Kappa Phi and received the Harry Ransom Dissertation Award, the Dean’s Award for Academic Excellence, and the GSBS Associates Scholarship. Her doctoral dissertation, a contribution to the burgeoning field of neuroethics, examined the confidentiality and privacy implications of advances in functional magnetic resonance imaging. Dr. Tovino earned her J.D., magna cum laude, from the University of Houston Law Center in 1997, and her B.A. in economics, magna cum laude, from Tulane University in 1994. She practiced health law in the Health Industries Group at Vinson & Elkins in Houston, Texas, between 1997 and 2003.

Selected Publications

Neuroimaging, Psychiatric Diagnosis and the Law (in progress).   

Neuroscience, Mandated Benefits and Alternative Medicine (under review).

Incidental Findings: A Common Law Approach, Journal of Accountability in Research (forthcoming 2008).

Neuroimaging Research into Disorders of Consciousness: Moral Imperative or Legal and Ethics Failure?, Virginia Journal of Law & Technology (forthcoming 2008). 

The Impact of Neuroscience on Health Law, Neuroethics (in press 2008).

Functional Neuroimaging Information: A Case for Neuro Exceptionalism?, 34 Florida State University Law Review 415 (2007). 

Psychiatric Restraint and Seclusion: Resisting Legislative Solution, 47 Santa Clara Law Review 511 (2007).

Imaging Body Structure and Mapping Brain Function: A Historical Approach, 33 American Journal of Law & Medicine 193 (2007).

Neuroimaging and the Law: Trends and Directions for Future Scholarship, 7(9) American Journal of Bioethics-Neuroscience 44 (2007).

Incorporating Literature into a Health Law Curriculum, 9 Journal of Medicine & Law 213 (2005).

Hospital Chaplaincy under the HIPAA Privacy Rule: Health Care or “Just Visiting the Sick?”, 2 Indiana Health Law Review 51 (2005).

A Primer on the Law and Ethics of Treatment, Research, and Public Policy in the Context of Severe Traumatic Brain Injury, 14 Annals of Health Law 1 (2005) (with William J. Winslade).

Confidentiality and Privacy Implications of Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, 33 Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics 844 (2005). 

Research with Brain-Injured Subjects, 19 Journal of Head Trauma Rehabilitation 513 (2004) (with William J. Winslade). 

American Midwifery Litigation and State Legislative Preferences for Physician-Controlled Childbirth, 11 Cardozo Women's Law Journal 61 (2004).

The Use and Disclosure of Protected Health Information for Research under the HIPAA Privacy Rule: Unrealized Patient Autonomy and Burdensome Government Regulation, 49 South Dakota Law Review 447 (2004).  

Selected Paper Presentations

September 25, 2008, Neuroscience, Law & Government Symposium, University of Akron School of Law, Akron, Ohio. 

June 6, 2008, "Teaching Health Law through Literature," Health Law Professors Conference, Drexel University College of Law, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 

April 5, 2008, Law and Neuroscience Workshop, Stanford Law School, Palo Alto, California.  

March 7, 2008, "Neuroscience and Health Law: An Integrative Approach?" University of Wisconsin-Madison, Neuroscience and Public Policy Dual-Degree Program. 

March 1, 2008, "Neuroscience and Health Law: An Integrative Approach," NeuroLaw: What Neuroscience Offers to Law Conference, Amherst College, Amherst, Massachusetts.

February 28, 2008, "Neuroethics," Psi Chi Chapter, Minnesota State University, Mankato, Minnesota. 

November 20, 2007, "NeuroLaw," University of St. Thomas School of Law, Saint Paul, Minnesota.   

October 29-31, 2007, "Functional Neuroimaging and Perceptions of Mental Health and Mental Illness," World Federation for Mental Health, Transcultural Mental Health in a Changing World: Building a Global Response Conference, Minneapolis, Minnesota.

October 26-27, 2007, "Bioethics and Neuroimaging," First Annual Law, Ethics, and the Life Sciences Conference, University of Louisville, Louis D. Brandeis School of Law, Louisville, Kentucky.

August 26-28, 2007, "Implanting Change: The Ethics of Neural Prosthetics," Pennsylvania State University, State College, Pennsylvania.

May 31- June 2, 2007, "Psychiatric Restraint and Seclusion: Resisting Legislative Solution," American Society of Law, Medicine & Ethics, 30th Annual Health Law Professors Conference, Boston University School of Law, Boston, Massachusetts.

April 28, 2007, "Neuroethics and the Law," MidBrains 2007 Undergraduate Neuroscience Conference, Macalester College, Saint Paul, Minnesota.

April 19-21, 2007, "From the Brain to Human Culture: Intersections between the Humanities and Neuroscience," sponsored by Bucknell University's Comparative Humanities Program, Lewisburg, Pennsylvania.

April 13, 2007, "Health, Disability, and Employment Law Implications of Advances in MRI," Law and Ethics of Brain Scanning conference, sponsored by the Center for the Study of Law, Science & Technology at the ASU Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law, held at the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona, Phoenix, Arizona.

February 16, 2007, "Health Law Implications of Advances in Functional Neuroimaging," Minnesota State Bar Association, Health Law Section monthly meeting, Minneapolis, Minnesota.

February 3, 2007, "Imaging Body Structure and Mapping Brain Function: A Historical Approach," American Journal of Law and Medicine, Brain Imaging and the Law Symposium, Boston University School of Law, Boston, Massachusetts.

Selected Publications

• "Psychiatric Restraint and Seclusion: Resisting Legislative Solution" ", 47 Santa Clara Law Review (forthcoming 2007)"
• "Functional Neuroimaging Information: A Case for Neuro Exceptionalism?" ", 34 Florida State University Law Review (forthcoming 2007)"
• "Imaging Body Structure and Mapping Brain Function: A Historical Approach" ", 33 American Journal of Law & Medicine (forthcoming 2007)"
• "Neuroimaging and the Law: Trends and Directions for Future Scholarship" ", Am. J. Bioethics-Neuroscience (forthcoming 2007)"
• "Incorporating Literature into a Health Law Curriculum" ", 9 Journal of Medicine & Law 213 (2005)" PDF
• "Confidentiality and Privacy Implications of Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging" ", 33 Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics 844 (2005)"
• "Hospital Chaplaincy under the HIPAA Privacy Rule: Health Care or “Just Visiting the Sick?”" ", 2 Indiana Health Law Review 51 (2005)"
• "A Primer on the Law and Ethics of Treatment, Research, and Public Policy in the Context of Severe Traumatic Brain Injury" ", 14 Annals of Health Law 1 (2005) (with William J. Winslade)"
• "American Midwifery Litigation and State Legislative Preferences for Physician-Controlled Childbirth" ", 11 Cardozo Women's Law Journal 61 (2004)"
• "Research with Brain-Injured Subjects" ", 19 Journal of Head Trauma Rehabilitation 513 (2004) (with William J. Winslade)"
• "The Use and Disclosure of Protected Health Information for Research under the HIPAA Privacy Rule: Unrealized Patient Autonomy ", 49 South Dakota Law Review 447 (2004)" PDF