Biography
Barry Furrow is a pioneer in the field of health law. He is the lead author of “Health Law — Cases, Materials and Problems” (now in its 8th edition), which remains the leading casebook in the field. He is also co-author of the treatise, “Health Law,” which the U.S. Supreme Court has cited three times.
Professor Furrow is an influential scholar, named #10 on the 20 Most-cited Health Law Faculty list published by Harvard Law School's Petrie-Flom Center in 2018. His expertise spans a wide array of health-related topics, including health care policy, regulation and finance, patient safety, patient privacy, mental health, provider accountability, medical ethics and bioethics, and legal issues of pain management. He has authored or co-authored more than nine health law books and has written more than four dozen law review articles on state and federal regulation of medical errors and patient safety, big data and health law, pain management, sports medicine, tort reform, medical privacy and regulation of scientific research. His recent article, "The Limits of A.I. in Health Care: Patient Safety Policing in Hospitals," appears in Volume 12 of the Northeastern University Law Review. Previous articles have appeared in publications including the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, Duke Law Journal, Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review and Drexel Law Review. Professor Furrow is an editorial board member and former editor-in-chief of Law, Medicine & Health Care.
In 2018, he was selected by the U.S. Department of State Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs to serve as a Fulbright Specialist. In that capacity, he consults with faculty and students at academic institutions around the world to develop and refine programs that grapple with a range of legal issues in the health care sphere.
Professor Furrow came to the law school from Widener University School of Law, where he founded the Health Law Institute and earned the Jay Healey Distinguished Health Law Teaching Award from the American Society of Law, Medicine and Ethics. He also served as interim dean and dean of the faculty at Widener University School of Law. Previously, Professor Furrow directed the Health Law Center at the University of Detroit School of Law, where he also served as a full-time faculty member. He has also held full-time faculty posts at American University’s Washington College of Law and at George Mason University School of Law. His experience also includes teaching stints in the University of Michigan Law School and School of Public Health and the University of North Carolina School of Law in Chapel Hill.
He earned his JD at Harvard Law School before clerking with the Superior Court of Massachusetts and handling civil litigation and health-law cases with the Boston firm, Palmer & Dodge.