Michael Deem, PhD, and Robin Grubs, PhD, associate professors in the Department of Human Genetics, served as editors for The Oxford Handbook of Genetic Counseling, a comprehensive new resource for the field.
Released in October 2025, the handbook brings together decades of scholarship and practice, spanning the history of genetic counseling, its growth within health care systems and the ethical and social questions shaping its future. It is designed not only for genetic counselors, but also for professionals in bioethics, law and philosophy who engage with genetics in their work.
For Deem, the project began with a gap he encountered while writing about genetics and ethics in 2016.
“I noticed there was very little systematic investigation of the ethical issues in genetic counseling,” Deem said. “There were handbooks and scattered essays, but no single, comprehensive resource that covered the field.”
“Genetic counseling is essentially two fields in one,” Deem said. “You have counseling expertise—communication and interpersonal skills—and, at the same time, deep knowledge of genetics and its associations with disease and disability.”
Deem began the project with Emily Farrow, PhD, of the Children's Mercy Genomic Medicine Center. After moving to Pittsburgh, he connected with Grubs, who joined as a co-editor.
“Between the three of us, we had complementary expertise: philosophy and ethics, clinical genetic counseling and laboratory genetics,” said Deem. “That allowed us to build something broad and truly comprehensive.”
Grubs, who has spent nearly three decades with Pitt’s genetic counseling program, said the book’s biggest contribution is bringing together work that was dispersed across fields.
“It’s not that people weren’t studying ethics in genetic counseling—there’s been strong work in both genetics and bioethics journals,” said Grubs. “But it wasn’t centralized. This book creates that cohesion.”
The handbook places particular emphasis on ethics. While Pitt’s program includes an ethics course, the subject is not always taught as a standalone component across programs.
“Early on, the ethics literature in genetic counseling focused heavily on autonomy,” Deem said. “The field may have been slower to take up bigger questions—like what genetic counseling is ultimately for.”
Grubs said the book is especially useful for students.
“I can point students to one place and say, ‘Here’s where you can really understand the ethical and social dimensions of genetic counseling,’” she said.
The interdisciplinary editing process also fostered an academic friendship for Deem, Grubs and Farrow.
“I value this academic friendship personally as well as professionally,” Deem said.
-Ava Dzurenda