Karen S. Rheuban, MD

Karen S. Rheuban, MD currently serves as Professor of Pediatrics, Senior Associate Dean for External Affairs and Continuing Medical Education and Medical Director of the Office of Telemedicine at the University of Virginia.  As a pediatric cardiologist, Dr. Rheuban provides care to patients with congenital and acquired heart disease.  Dr. Rheuban is a fellow of the American College of Cardiology and the American Academy of Pediatrics.  She has regularly been listed in the "Best Doctors in America" database, and was recently recognized to be profiled in the National Library of Medicine's exhibit "Changing the Face of Medicine: Celebrating America's Women Physicians."

The Office of Telemedicine at the University of Virginia was developed to link remotely located patients and health professionals with the University's clinical consultative, research and educational expertise.  UVA now serves as the hub of a 60 site telehealth network in the Commonwealth of Virginia, which includes community hospitals, rural and urban health department clinics, federally qualified health centers, a rural school system and correctional facilities, and partners with other academic health centers and international collaborations through its network.  UVA annually supports more than 1200 consultative encounters with remotely located patients in more than 30 subspecialties, and offers additional teleradiology services, and a growing home telehealth initiative.  UVA has broadcast thousands of hours of health professional and patient education through its telehealth program.

UVA serves as the Commonwealth of Virginia’s Telehealth Resource Center, and has been awarded grants and contracts from the federal government, the Commonwealth, corporations and foundations to support the network. 

Dr. Rheuban also oversees the University's Office of Continuing Medical Education. That office develops and sponsors thousands of hours of continuing medical education per year using multiple formats, such as lectures, conferences, 30 affiliated hospitals and through computer-assisted instructional materials and web-based on-line offerings.

She has served as a board member and Treasurer of the American Telemedicine Association and is a board member and Vice Chair of Center for Telehealth and E-Health Law.  She is a member of the Virginia Telehealth Network.  She has presented Congressional testimony re telehealth to the Subcommittee on Health of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, to the Committee on Agriculture and to the Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health of the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the U.S. House of Representatives