Carolyn Constantin, PhD, RNC

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Biography

Dr. Constantin has more than 30 years of experience as a nursing professional in various roles as an educator, clinician, manager, and researcher. At UH Manoa Nursing she is committed to teaching undergraduate and graduate students, focusing on courses in pathophysiology, genetics, and complementary and alternative therapies. She has spent more than seven years enjoying a dual role of nurse educator in maternal and child nursing at Boston College and staff nurse in labor and delivery at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

Dr. Constantin’s clinical expertise is in women’s health and maternal child nursing. She has more than 22 years of experience managing low- and high-risk obstetric patients in a variety of inpatient clinical settings in antepartum, labor and delivery (L/D), postpartum, and transition care for newborns including community hospitals and large urban medical centers.

She has served as the manager for a team focused on public health initiatives related to single gene disorders at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia. She managed a $13.5 million budget and directed planning, implementation, and evaluation of a portfolio of research and educational activities involving public health initiatives related to rare disorders. Her team worked on projects involving surveillance, improving screening and identification, therapeutic strategies, and improving services for individuals and families who have rare disorders. The public health programs included rare disorders for the following disorders: Duchenne and Becker muscular dystrophy, fragile X syndrome, Charcot-Marie-Tooth, and spina bifida. She had oversight for program activities involving grants, cooperative agreements, and contracts.

Dr. Constantin’s research focused on evaluating the immune response during pregnancy. An understanding of the T-cell response pertaining to the generation of immunologic memory during pregnancy has significant clinical and biological implications. Specifically, her research focused on investigating T-cell responses during an acute viral infection in pregnancy. Using a mouse model, antigen-specific CD8+ T-cell responses were evaluated in response to an acute viral infection with Lymphocytic Choriomeningitis Virus (LCMV) through establishment of the memory phase and a recall response upon secondary challenge with the pathogen. The specific aims were to determine if the number and function of the antigen-specific memory CD8+ T-cells generated during an acute viral infection acquired during pregnancy was different than the response in a non-pregnant state.

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