Dr. Monica (Hutchingson) Kleinman
West 1980
Dr. Monica (Hutchingson) Kleinman is the clinical director of the Medical-Surgical Intensive Care Unit and the Critical Care Transport Team at Children’s Hospital Boston. She is recognized internationally as an authority on pediatric critical care and transport.
During her career, Kleinman has helped develop guidelines and training programs for pediatric resuscitation. In 1984, she became involved with the American Heart Association’s Pediatric Life Support program, rising through the ranks of the organization to become chair of the organization’s National Pediatric Subcommittee in 2007. In this position, she participated in the development of an updated version of the Pediatric Advanced Life Support course and was an editor for the course manuals. She also was appointed as the Pediatric Task Force co-chair for the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation, a multinational consortium that is responsible for the development of a consensus on resuscitation science every five years.
In 2006, the American Academy of Pediatrics enlisted Kleinman to serve as an associate editor for the organization’s Guidelines for Air and Ground Transport of Neonatal and Pediatric Patients. Transport medicine is a specialty that deals with the care of critically ill or injured children who require transfer from community hospitals to specialized pediatric centers.
In addition to her work in pediatric life support, Kleinman is on the board of directors of The Progeria Research Foundation. The foundation is dedicated to finding a cure for progeria, a rare and fatal genetic condition that causes children to age prematurely and die of heart disease or stroke at an average age of 13. Kleinman is co-investigator for the first clinical trial of drug therapy for children with the condition.
Kleinman has received many awards for her excellence as a teacher and as a physician. In 2000, she received the Charles A. Janeway Award from the Department of Medicine at Children’s Hospital Boston. In 1996, she received the Faculty Teaching Award from the Department of Pediatrics at Rhode Island Hospital. As a resident, she won several awards for teaching from the Brown University Medical School and Rhode Island Hospital.
Kleinman attended Brown University, where she earned her B.S. in biology (magna cum laude) in 1984. She later graduated from Brown Medical School with her doctorate in medicine in 1987. The first step of her post-graduate training was completed at Rhode Island Hospital in 1990, followed by fellowships in neonatology at Women & Infant’s Hospital in 1993; pediatric critical care at Yale-New Haven Hospital in 1994; and pediatric critical care at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston in 1995.