Patricia Bruckenthal

An expert in pain management, Dr. Pat Bruckenthal is a nationally recognized clinician and academic leader who has devoted her career to improving chronic pain assessment, management and clinical education. Currently, Bruckenthal serves as Associate Dean for Research and Innovation and Professor at Stony Brook University School of Nursing, where she has been instrumental in developing the PhD program within the school serving as the Chair of the Doctoral Studies in Nursing.

Bruckenthal joined Stony Brook Medicine in 1981 as a registered nurse in the initial stages of the opening of our hospital. In 1989 she became a Clinical Instructor in the Department of Neurology in the School of Medicine as a nurse practitioner and joined the School of Nursing as a Clinical Assistant Professor in 1993 where she held a range of roles. She became Chair of the Department of Graduate Studies in Advanced Practice Nursing in 2010 before moving to her role as Associate Dean for Research and Innovation in 2016.

Bruckenthal has sat on several advisory committees to improve outcomes for people with chronic pain, including the Pain Action Alliance to Implement a National Strategy (PAINS), the Department of Defense and Veterans Administration Army Pain Task Force and the Leadership Advisory Council of the States Pain and Policy Advisory Council. She is a nationally recognized expert in pain management and has developed and advised on pain management curricula for the Medical Society for the State of New York and is a member of the Collaborative Education in Substance Use Advisory Council for Harvard Medical School/Department of Global and Continuing Education.

She has been integral in developing interprofessional education and care delivery models, including the Partnership for Advancing Collaborative Education (PACE) Center, which evolved from a partnership with Stony Brook Dental Medicine to deliver preventive health screening and health promotion to older adults and vulnerable populations. Additionally, she was a member of a multisite, NIH-funded research team to investigate Nurse Practitioner-led Coping Skills Training for Osteoarthritis Patients, with her training model applied to other health professions.

Bruckenthal earned her PhD in nursing at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and her post-doctoral training at the Applied Behavioral Medicine Institute at Stony Brook University, Department of Psychiatry. She is a fellow in the American Academy of Nursing and an Advanced Diplomat in the American Academy for Integrative Pain Management. She has served as the President of the American Society for Pain Management Nursing and is an Associate Editor for Pain Management Nursing. Bruckenthal has been published in two dozen peer-reviewed journals, has authored numerous contributed book chapters and has been an invited speaker at professional conferences both in the U.S. and internationally.