Marci Lee Nilsen, PhD, MSN, RN, CHPN, FAAN

Marci Nilsen, PhD, RN, CHPN, FAAN, is a Professor in the Department of Otolaryngology–Head & Neck Surgery at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and holds a secondary appointment in the School of Nursing. She serves as Co-Leader of the Biobehavioral Cancer Control Program at the UPMC Hillman Cancer Center and directs the multidisciplinary UPMC Head & Neck Cancer Survivorship Clinic, one of the nation’s most comprehensive clinical programs dedicated to multidisciplinary survivorship care. She is also a certified hospice and palliative care nurse, a foundation that informs her focus on symptom management, quality of life, and serious-illness communication across the cancer continuum.

Her research focuses on identifying the biological, clinical, and contextual mechanisms that drive inter-patient variability in treatment-related effects and on advancing methods to assess and improve late and long-term outcomes in head and neck cancer survivors. She leads a robust NIH-funded research program that integrates symptom science, survivorship outcomes, patient-reported measures, and translational approaches to understand radiation-induced fibrosis, pain, dysphagia, functional impairment, and social and structural drivers of health. She is Principal Investigator for multiple studies, including an NCI MERIT Award examining radiation-induced fibrosis and co-occurring adverse effects, a Gordon & Betty Moore Foundation fellowship aimed at improving symptom management in under-resourced settings, and a federally funded microRNA biodosimeter project (site PI). She is also Co-I on multiple R01s spanning cancer pain, immunotherapy response, and biologic effects of social determinants of health.

Dr. Nilsen’s clinical and research leadership is grounded in nearly a decade of directing and expanding a survivorship clinic serving thousands of patients across UPMC sites. Her work has helped shape national models for multidisciplinary survivorship care, building an interprofessional program that supports patients from pre-radiation baseline assessment through long-term follow-up and integrates rehabilitation and precision symptom management across every stage. She has authored more than 70 peer-reviewed publications and book chapters and contributes to several head and neck cancer textbooks, including Bailey’s Head and Neck Surgery.

A committed mentor, Dr. Nilsen has guided trainees across disciplines—medical students, residents, PhD students, postdoctoral fellows, and early-career clinicians—and has been recognized with mentoring and leadership awards from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Nursing and remains active in national and international professional societies focused on oncology, survivorship, and head and neck cancer care.