Joyce Adams, MD
Retired Clinical Professor of Pediatrics
University of California, San Diego School of Medicine
Dr. Adams has been involved in the medical evaluation of suspected sexual abuse since 1984, first as the director of the Sexual Abuse Evaluation Program at the University of Kansas Medical Center, and then at Valley Medical Center in Fresno, California. From 1994 through 2014, she was faculty in Pediatrics at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine. She also worked as a specialist in Child Abuse Pediatrics at Rady Children’s Hospital, San Diego for 10 years. Dr. Adams currently provides expert review of cases of suspected child sexual abuse for medical providers at several locations inside and outside the United States.
Dr. Adams has published extensively in the field of medical evaluation of suspected sexual abuse and is known for the development and continuing revision of a medical literature-based tool for interpreting medical findings in suspected sexual abuse. She speaks at national and international meetings on topics of sexual abuse and adolescent gynecology, and is active as an expert witness in child sexual abuse cases nationwide.
Dr. Adams has been active in several professional organizations for physicians and is also an elected member of an honorary society for physicians involved in the field of child maltreatment, the Ray E. Helfer Society. Dr. Adams was among the first group of pediatricians to become Board Certified in the newly recognized subspecialty of Child Abuse Pediatrics.