Dr. Carolyn Phillips is an assistant professor at the University of Texas at Austin School of Nursing. She received her BSN from the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing (2001), her MSN from the University of New Mexico (2011), and a PhD from the University of Texas at Austin (2019) where she was a RWJF Scholar. Before joining the faculty at UT Austin, she spent two years as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School.
Dr. Phillips has been an oncology nurse for over 20 years. Her clinical and research expertise is in oncology and end-of-life care and she is interested in the psychoneuroimmunological mechanisms of grief and trauma and the development of expressive arts-based interventions to improve communication about and coping with complex emotions. In her current research, she examines the impact of storytelling through music with family and professional caregivers, and is specifically interested in its effect on brain connectivity, the alignment between neuro-affective and cognitive states, and the long-term effect on psychosocial well-being.