Skip to main content
image2
Benjamin E. Haithcock, M.D.

Benjamin Haithcock, M.D., was honored May 10 as a “Friend of Nursing” at UNC Hospitals in a ceremony marking the 2013 Nursing Staff Recognition Week.

Dr. Haithcock is a thoracic surgeon and is surgical director of UNC Hospitals’ Lung Transplant Program and a physician in the UNC Multidisciplinary Thoracic Oncology Program, which treats patients with lung cancer and other chest cancers. He is assistant professor of surgery in the UNC Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery and has a joint appointment as assistant professor of anesthesiology at UNC.

At the ceremony, Dr. Haithcock was praised as “an exceptional surgeon providing excellent patient care.”

“He serves as an outstanding role model for physicians and nurses, is always respectful of his colleagues and is a nurse advocate,” his award citation stated. “The nursing staff’s relationship with Dr. Haithcock is the ideal physician-nurse alliance, exemplified by his willingness to collaborate and plan the care of his patients with all members of the interprofessional team.”

Dr. Haithcock joined the UNC faculty in July 2007 after completing his cardiothoracic surgery residency at UNC. He received his M.D. from Michigan State University in 1998 and completed a General Surgery residency at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit in 2004. He earned a B.S. in chemistry from the University of Michigan.

His clinical interests include thoracic oncology, including cancer of the lung and esophagus; heart and lung transplantation; end-stage lung disease; and minimally-invasive thoracic surgery.

At UNC, Dr. Haithcock is an active researcher and teacher. He has served as a member of UNC Hospitals’ Ethics Committee. He has been an investigator in a Cancer and Leukemia Group B (CALGB) trial of lobectomy vs. sublobar resection for small peripheral non-small cell lung cancer. He also has been a co-investigator with Thomas M. Egan, MD, on several lung transplant studies, including an NIH grant for study of ex-vivo (outside the body) perfusion and ventilation of lungs to assess transplant suitability.