A physician, educator, and leader for more than 25 years, Dr. Girard has devoted her career to hospital-based integrative medicine and educating health care professionals across specialties.
Her practice has focused on integrative oncology and end of life care. Dr. Girard has developed and taught undergraduate and master’s level courses for the online programs at the University of Arizona’s Mel & Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health. Topics include health education/health promotion, budget and finance, sociocultural and behavioral aspects of public health, strategic planning and marketing, and the master’s capstone integrated public health learning experience. She has held senior leadership positions throughout her career in medicine and in higher education.
Past President/CEO of the National University of Natural Medicine, Portland, Oregon, she previously served as the Executive Vice-President of Southwest College of Naturopathic Medicine. Past director of Naturopathic Medicine at Southwestern Regional Medical Center in Tulsa, OK—a Cancer Treatment Centers of America hospital, Dr. Girard maintains an interest in an integrative approach to cancer treatment. She is the co-founder and past co-director of the Integrative Medicine Center at Griffin Hospital, Derby, CT. While at Griffin Hospital, Dr. Girard served as a Clinical Research Specialist at the Yale-Griffin Prevention Research Center.
Her research and special interests focus on integrative medicine, inter-profession education in the clinical setting, nutrition, non-opioid treatments for pain, access to primary care for underserved populations, and sex risk assessment and cancer screenings for LGBTQ+ people.
Dr. Girard received her ND from National College of Naturopathic Medicine, Portland Oregon and her MPH from the University of Arizona’s Mel & Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health.
Awards include the Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust’s Piper Fellows Program (2013), American Association of Naturopathic Physicians’ Physician of the Year Award (2010), and National College of Naturopathic Medicine’s Pioneer Award (2008).
