Martin McCarthy, Jr., PhD

Research Associate Professor

Dr. McCarthy is a health psychologist and a health services researcher with two main interests -- the use of behavioral and information technologies in health promotion and the assessment of patient-level outcomes of medical care.

He holds an AB degree in History from Georgetown University, an MA in Experimental Psychology from Columbia University, a PhD in Community Psychology from New York University, and completed a Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Health Psychology at Northwestern's Feinberg School of Medicine. He has also had considerable training in psychotherapy and is licensed to practice as a clinical psychologist in New York State and in Illinois.

Previous academic appointments were at the Center for Health Services and Policy Research at Northwestern University, the Center for Geriatrics and Gerontology in the School of Public Health at Columbia University, and the Milhauser Laboratories at New York University Medical Center.

Current Interests

Multimedia Internet-based educational interventions have been developed for use in managed care settings, clinics, school systems, and patients' homes. Specific projects are concerned with reducing children’s experimentation with tobacco products, preventing sexually transmitted diseases in adolescents and young adults, promoting skin cancer control in a range of age groups, improving management of risk factors in diabetic patients, promoting the early detection of breast cancer in older women, and teaching multimodal pain management to patients with acute and chronic back problems.

Health services research projects focus on the measurement of functional status, health-related quality of life, and psychosocial risk factors in a variety of patient groups. Ongoing research studies are examining the impact of processes and structures of care on the outcomes of cardiac surgery; comparative outcomes of cardiac surgery; comparative outcomes of laparascopic and open surgical procedures; and emotional, behavioral, and lifestyle risk factors in the epidemiology of cardiovascular disease.

Recent Publications

1. Robert J. Fitzgibbons, Jr, MD, Anita Giobbie-Hurder, MS, James O. Gibbs, PhD, Dorothy D. Dunlop, PhD, Domenic J. Reda, PhD, Martin McCarthy, Jr, PhD, Leigh A. Neumayer, MD, Jeffrey S. T. Barkun, MD, James L. Hoehn, MD, Joseph T. Murphy, MD, George A. Sarosi, Jr, MD, William C. Syme, MD, Jon S. Thompson, MD, Jia Wang, MS, Olga Jonasson, MD. "Watchful Waiting vs Repair of Inguinal Hernia in Minimally Symptomatic Men - A Randomized Clinical Trial." JAMA, January 18, 2006—Vol 295, No. 3 285-292.

2. Martin McCarthy Jr, PhD, Olga Jonasson, MD, FACS, Chih-Hung Chang, PhD, A Simon Pickard, PhD, Anita Giobbie-Hurder, MS, James Gibbs, PhD, Perry Edelman, PhD, Robert Fitzgibbons, MD, FACS, Leigh Neumayer, MD, FACS. "Assessment of Patient Functional Status after Surgery." J Am Coll Surg.

3. Martin McCarthy Jr, PhD, Chih-Hung Chang, PhD, A Simon Pickard, PhD, Anita Giobbie-Hurder, MS, Donald D Price, PhD, Olga Jonasson, MD, FACS, James Gibbs, PhD, Robert Fitzgibbons, MD, FACS, Leigh Neumayer, MD, FACS. "Visual Analog Scales for Assessing Surgical Pain." J Am Coll Surg.

4. Ho PM, Arciniegas DB, Grigsby J, McCarthy, Jr. M, McDonald GO, Moritz TE, Shroyer AL, Sethis GK, Henderson WG, London MJ, VillaNueva CB, Grover FL and Hammermeister KE. "Predictors of Cognitive Decline Following Coronary Artery Bypass Graft Surgery." Ann Thorac Surg 2004 Feb;77(2):579-603.

5. O'Brien MM, Shroyer AL, Moritz TE, London MJ, Grunwald GK, Villanueva CB, Thottapurathu LG, MaWhinney S, Marshall G, McCarthy, Jr. M, Henderson WG, Sethi GK, Grover FL and Hammermeister KE. "Relationship Between Processes of Care and Coronary Bypass Operative Mortality and Morbidity." Medical Care January 2004; Volume 42, Number 1.

6. McCarthy, Jr. M. "The Skin Sense Clinical Trial" in Kolter P, Roberto N, Lee N. Social Marketing -- Improving the Quality of Life, Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, 2002.

7. Rumsfeld JS, Magid DJ, O'Brien M, McCarthy, Jr. M, MaWhinney S, Shroyer ALW, Moritz TE, Henderson WG, Sethi GK, Grover FL, Hammermeister KE. "Changes in Health-Related Quality of Life Following Coronary Artery Bypass Graft Surgery." Annals of Thoracic Surgery 2001;72:2026-2032.

8. McCarthy, Jr. M, Liu K, Colangelo L, Isen S, and Chamberlain MA. "Affective and behavioral risk factors associated with adverse health outcomes in the Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults study population." American Public Health Association Annual Meeting, October 22, 2001, Atlanta, Georgia.

9. Rumsfeld J, Mawhinney S, McCarthy, Jr. M, Shroyer L, and the PSOCS Investigators. Health Related Quality of Life as a Predictor of Mortality Following Coronary Artery Bypass Graft Surgery, JAMA, 281:1298-1303, 1999.

10. McCarthy, Jr. M, Rademaker A, Huang C-F, Jones B, Niedos M, Sylvester J. Discouraging smoking among tween-agers: The 'tobaccoid' video game. Fourth International Congress of Behavioral Medicine, Washington, DC, March 14, 1996.

11. McCarthy, Jr. M, Shroyer AL, Sethi GK, Moritz TE, Henderson WG, Grover FL, London MJ, Gibbs JO, Lansky D, Miller D, Clark J, Hammermeister KE. Self report measures for assessing treatment outcomes in cardiac surgery patients. Medical Care 1995;S33(10):76-85.

12. Gibbs JO, Giobbie-Hurder A, Edelman P, McCarthy M Jr, Fitzgibbons RJ Jr. Does delay of hernia repair in minimally symptomatic men burden the patient’s family? J Am Coll Surg. 2007 Sep;205(3):409-12.

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