Jerome Paulson, M.D.

Jerome A. Paulson, MD, FAAP is an internationally recognized expert on environmental problems that impact on the health of children. He is Professor Emeritus of Pediatrics at the George Washington University School of Medicine & Health Sciences and Professor Emeritus of Environmental & Occupational Health at the Milken Institute School of Public Health at GW.
He served for over a decade of as the director of the Mid-Atlantic Center for Children’s Environmental Health, the PEHSU that serves Federal Region 3 – DC, VA, WV, MD, DE and PA. He was the medical director of the Pediatric Environmental Health Specialty Unit-East Program for the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Dr Paulson has frequently testified before Congress or participated in Congressional briefings on environmental health issues including air pollution, water pollution, lead poisoning, unconventional gas extraction (fracking). He has advised health professionals, parents, lawyers and others on a wide range of topics including, lead exposure, mercury exposure, damp buildings and mold, asthma, toxicants from an asphalt plant, exposures to radioactive materials, exposure to brominated flame retardants and other environmental health hazards. He has lectured in numerous venues in the US and overseas on pediatric environmental health including climate change, environmental health policy, reform of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) and other issues.
He holds a B.S. in Biochemistry with Honors and with General Honors from the University of Maryland, and an M.D. from Duke University. He did his residency training in pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins Hospitals and Sinai Hospital, both in Baltimore, as well as a fellowship in ambulatory pediatrics at Sinai Hospital.
Dr Paulson taught and practiced primary care pediatrics for many years at Case Western Reserve University-Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital, at George Washington University and at Children’s Pediatricians & Associates which is in Washington, DC. In 2008, he became the medical director for national and global affairs in the Child Health Advocacy Institute of Children’s National Health System in Washington, DC.
In 2015, after nearly 25 years on the faculties of the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences and the George Washington University Milken Institute School of Public Health, Dr Paulson was named Professor Emeritus in Pediatrics in School of Medicine and Professor Emeritus in Environmental & Occupational Health at the School of Public Health. He is currently a consultant to non-governmental organizations, lawyers and others in matters related to children’s health and the environment.
Dr. Paulson served on the Executive Committee of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Council on Environmental Health from 2007 to 2015, and was chair of the Executive Committee from 2011-2015. He served 6 years as a member of the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). From 2000 until early 2015, he was the director of the Mid-Atlantic Center for Children’s Health and the Environment (MACCHE), one of 10 pediatric environmental health specialty units (PEHSUs) in the US.
In 2014, Dr Paulson was elected to the Collegium Ramazzini, an international honorary society of 185 experts focused on environmental health issues. He also received the Hero’s Award from the Healthy Schools Network, a national nongovernmental organization focused on environmental health in schools. Dr. Paulson served on the Pediatric Medical Care Committee of the National Commission on Children and Disasters and was part of the National Conversation on Public Health and Chemical Exposures organized by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR). In 2011, Dr Paulson was elected to the American Pediatric Society primarily on the basis of his work in public policy and advocacy. In October 2004 he was a Dozor Visiting Professor at Ben Gurion University in Beer Sheva, Israel. He lectured there and throughout Israel on children’s environmental health. Dr. Paulson was a recipient of a Soros Advocacy Fellowship for Physicians from the Open Society Institute and worked with the Children’s Environmental Health Network in the early 2000s. He also served as a special assistant to the director of the National Center on Environmental Health of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention working on children’s environmental health issues. During the 1985-86 academic-year, he was a Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellow and worked on Capitol Hill for a member of the US House of Representatives. Dr. Paulson served on the American Academy of Pediatrics Council on Government Affairs and chaired the Public Policy Committee of the Ambulatory Pediatric Association (now the Academic Pediatric Association). He has published papers and book chapters on a number of topics related to children’s health and the environment and has served on numerous boards and committees related to children’s environmental health.
Outside of his work in health care, Dr. Paulson has served on the board of directors of the Jewish Social Services Agency (JSSA) for the Greater Washington DC area and chaired its Northern Virginia Committee. He served on the board of directors and was president of the James Renwick Alliance, a national organization that supports the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. He has served on the board of directors of the Creative Glass Center of America, a facility in Millville, NJ that provides fellowships to artists using glass as a medium for creativity. He has also served on the board of directors of the Art Alliance for Creative Glass, a national, nonprofit whose mission is to further the development and appreciation of art made from glass.