Judith Nelson

Judith Nelson, MD, JD

Areas of Expertise

Conditions I Treat

  • Symptoms and side effects

My Specialties

  • Supportive care
  • Palliative care
  • Pain management
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Get to Know Me

Dr. Nelson received her JD from Harvard Law School, and MD from New York University School of Medicine.  She completed residency and fellowship at Mount Sinai in New York, and is board certified in Internal Medicine, Palliative Medicine, Pulmonary Disease, Critical Care Medicine. At Mount Sinai, she was Professor of Medicine, Associate Director of the Medical Intensive Care Unit, Director of the Respiratory Care Unit, and a faculty member of the Hertzberg Palliative Care Institute.

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Dr. Nelson’s research interests relate to the integration of palliative care with intensive care and with oncologic care. She received a Faculty Scholar Award from the Soros Foundation’s Project on Death in America, the Roger Bone Award for Advances in End-of-Life Care from the American College of Chest Physicians, and the Grenvik Family Award for Ethics from the Society of Critical Care Medicine. Dr. Nelson is Principal Investigator of a multi-center study funded by NIH to improve communication and decision-making for patients with chronic critical illness on prolonged mechanical ventilation. With support from an NIA K07 Academic Career Leadership Award and the Center to Advance Palliative Care, she launched The IPAL-ICU Project, of which she is Director, to assist in improving palliative care for ICU patients and families. Dr. Nelson has published numerous peer-reviewed articles and lectures frequently across the United States and abroad. In April 2016, Dr. Nelson was named Chief, Supportive Care Service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, where she has a joint appointment in Critical Care.

What I Do at MSK

I'm a supportive care doctor, with special training in care that supports people with cancer. I help improve quality of life and manage the symptoms and side effects of cancer and its treatment.

  • Attending Physician
Areas of Expertise

Conditions I Treat

  • Symptoms and side effects

My Specialties

  • Supportive care
  • Palliative care
  • Pain management
  • Managing symptoms of cancer treatment
  • Clinical trials
Education & Honors

Education

  • MD, New York University School of Medicine
  • JD, Harvard Law School

Residencies

  • Mount Sinai School of Medicine

Fellowships

  • Mount Sinai School of Medicine

Board Certifications

  • Internal Medicine
  • Pulmonary Disease
  • Critical Care Medicine
  • Hospice and Palliative Medicine

Awards and Honors

  • Castle Connolly: America’s Top Doctor (2025)
  • Castle Connolly: Exceptional Women in Medicine (2024)
  • Castle Connolly: America’s Top Doctor (2024)
  • Top Doctors New York Metro Area, Castle Connolly (2023)
  • Exceptional Women in Medicine Award, Castle Connolly (2023)
  • Castle Connolly: America's Top Doctors (2023)
  • Castle Connolly: New York Magazine Top Doctors (2010, 2017)

Insurance Information

Understanding your insurance options is an important part of managing your cancer care. We have relationships with many common healthcare providers and plans.

Don't see your carrier or plan? We can help you understand your coverage.

If you don't have health insurance or are worried that your care may not be fully covered, our financial assistance programs may be able to help.

If you have questions about insurance, call us at 646-497-9176.

Contact and Location

Dr. Nelson sees patients at one location.

Office Phone
Location
New York, NY
1275 York Avenue New York NY 10065

Looking to see a doctor at a different location? See all MSK locations.

Colleagues

Doctors at Memorial Sloan Kettering work as teams, with specialists from all different areas. This allows us to consider all your needs together, and to give you the best possible care.

See all Supportive Care doctors

Clinical Trials

Smiling doctors in the lab
Find a Clinical Trial for You

Memorial Sloan Kettering's doctors and scientists are constantly developing new treatments for cancer. MSK is typically running hundreds of clinical trials at a given time.

You may be able to participate in a clinical trial even if you are new to MSK. Search our online directory to find trial information and see more about who can participate.

Search clinical trials

Research and Publications

Publications on PubMed

Visit PubMed for a full listing of Dr. Nelson’s journal articles. Pubmed is an online index of research papers and other articles from the US National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health.

See all on PubMed

Disclosures

Doctors and faculty members often work with pharmaceutical, device, biotechnology, and life sciences companies, and other organizations outside of MSK, to find safe and effective cancer treatments, to improve patient care, and to educate the health care community.

MSK requires doctors and faculty members to report (“disclose”) the relationships and financial interests they have with external entities. As a commitment to transparency with our community, we make that information available to the public.

Judith Nelson discloses the following relationships and financial interests:

No disclosures meeting criteria for time period


If you’re a patient at MSK and would like more information about your doctor’s external relationships, please talk with your doctor.

The information published here is a complement to other publicly reported data and is for a specific annual disclosure period. There may be differences between information on this and other public sites as a result of different reporting periods and/or the various ways relationships and financial interests are categorized by organizations that publish such data.


This page and data include information for a specific MSK annual disclosure period (January 1, 2023 through disclosure submission in spring 2024). This data reflects interests that may or may not still exist. This data is updated annually.

Learn more about MSK’s COI policies here. For questions regarding MSK’s COI-related policies and procedures, email MSK’s Compliance Office at [email protected].


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