About Dr. Stansell

Dr. John Stansell is a board certified internist (adult medicine specialist) and is board certified in the medicine subspecialty of Pulmonary Disease.  It was through Dr. Stansell's interest in pulmonary infections, particularly Pneumocystis pneumonia, that led him into a career performing research on and management of HIV related illness.

Dr. Stansell earned his undergraduate degree in Political Science (it was the 60's afterall) and Biology/Chemistry from Tulane University in New Orleans, LA in 1970.  After college, Dr. Stansell set forth to find himself and ended up driving an ambulance in Los Angeles for several years.  In 1975, Dr. Stansell moved to Washington, D.C. to begin graduate studies in physiology at George Washington University.  While in D.C. Dr. Stansell was a volunteer with the Gay Men's Venereal Disease Clinic in Georgetown and, ultimately, one of the founders of D.C.'s Whitman-Walker Clinic.  Dr. Stansell spent five years studying cellular differentiation in Dictyostelium discoideum and was trying to complete his doctoral dissertation at the time he entered medical school in 1981.  Dr. Stansell completed his M.D. (with distinction) and was elected to Alpha Omega Alpha, the national medical honor society, at George Washington University in 1985.

After medical school, Dr. Stansell entered the internal medicine residency at Stanford University Medical Center.  At the time Stanford shared the ward rotations with the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) at San Francisco General Hospital (SFGH).  It was while working at San Francisco General during the early days of the AIDS epidemic that Dr. Stansell first encountered the rewards and challenges of HIV care.  After residency, Dr. Stansell entered the UCSF fellowship program in Pulmonary Disease.

In 1988, Drs. Merle Sande and Paul Volberding asked Dr. Stansell to assume medical directorship of Ward 5A, the AIDS ward, at San Francisco General.  Dr. Stansell served as SFGH Inpatient AIDS Medical Director until early 1992 when he became Medical Director of the entire UCSF AIDS program.  The UCSF AIDS Program is nationally and internationally recognized as among the foremost programs in HIV research and care.  Many of the routinely used procedures and therapies employed in HIV management arose from research at UCSF and SFGH.

During his tenure with UCSF/SFGH, Dr. Stansell has remained active with national medical organizations, including the AMA, American Thoracic Society and the American Academy of HIV Medicine (AAHIVM).  Dr. Stansell served two years as chair of the California/Hawaii chapter of the AAHIVM and is now completing two years as chair of the AAHIVM national board of directors.  Dr. Stansell is an AAHIVM certified HIV specialist.