Robert Arnold MD completed his medical training at the University of Missouri-Kansas City in 1983, and his internship and residency in primary care internal medicine at the Rhode Island Hospital in 1986. His additional training has included a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania. He is currently the Leo H Criep chair in Patient Care, Professor and Chair of the Section of Palliative Care and Medical Ethics at the University of Pittsburgh. He is also Director of the Institute on Doctor-Patient Communication and a core member of the Institute to Enhance Palliative Care. Dr. Arnold is board certified in Internal Medicine and Hospice and Palliative Medicine, and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine. He has been the President of the American Society of Bioethics and Humanities and the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine.

Dr. Arnold's major research interest are focused on educational interventions to improve communication in life-limiting illnesses and better understanding how ethical precepts are operationalized in clinical practice. His current work is focused on teaching oncologists to teach communication skills as well as projects designed to teach both adult and pediatric intensivists communication skills with critical ill patients and their family.

Dr. Arnold's research has been funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health, the Jewish Health Care Foundation, the Arthur Vining Davis Foundation, and the Greenwall Foundation.