Lara Carson Weinstein, MD, MPH, DrPH
Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University
As a family physician, addiction medicine specialist, and public health researcher in the department of family and community medicine at the Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University (SKMC), Lara Carson Weinstein, MD, MPH, DrPH, has built a distinguished career supporting the most vulnerable patients in her hometown of Philadelphia. While a preclerkship medical student at Jefferson Medical College (now SKMC), Dr. Weinstein and her peers were alarmed by the growing number of people experiencing homelessness around them. They connected with Project HOME, a nationally recognized organization providing supportive housing, employment, education, and health care to people who are unhoused or have low incomes. This collaboration developed into Jeff HOPE, a network of student-run medical clinics operating under the guidance of James Plumb, MD, and the college’s department of family and community medicine. The program has grown significantly since the early 1990s, providing acute care and connecting individuals with the long-term resources needed for improved health outcomes. It also provides transformative learning experiences for future physicians, with most SKMC students choosing to volunteer at Jeff HOPE despite no school requirement to do so.
Based on this early experience, Dr. Weinstein has led the development of transformative innovations in care delivery, including the Pathways to Housing PA Integrated Care Clinic, the region’s first embedded primary care program for individuals living in Pathways supportive housing who have histories of chronic homelessness and psychiatric disability. She also leads the Stephen and Sandra Sheller Consult and Bridge Program, a first-in-Philadelphia initiative that seamlessly coordinates acute hospital treatment, outpatient substance use disorder treatment, primary care, and social services. Across these initiatives and patient interactions, Dr. Weinstein consistently meets patients in their own environments where they feel most comfortable, providing treatment without discrimination, and addressing their individual physical, emotional, and social needs.
Not just a compassionate clinician, Dr. Weinstein is also a deeply respected teacher, mentor, and role model. As one former student put it, “It’s impossible not to feel inspired to be a more compassionate and empathetic person and physician in her presence.”
Dr. Weinstein has earned numerous accolades, including the 2007 Arnold P. Gold Foundation Leonard Tow Humanism in Medicine Faculty Award and the 2011 Jefferson Medical College Faculty Community Service Award. She was named Practitioner of the Year by the Philadelphia County Medical Society in 2017 and earned the peer-selected Sidney Kimmel Medical College Outstanding Clinician Award in 2021.
Dr. Weinstein earned an MD from Jefferson Medical College in 1995 and completed residency and fellowship training at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. She earned an MPH from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in 2011 and a DrPH from Drexel University Dornsife School of Public Health in 2018.