Associate Professor of Law and Public Health at West Virginia University
About
An honors graduate of Georgetown University Law Center, Professor Oliva was a public interest law scholar and served as executive notes and comments editor of The Georgetown Law Journal. Prior to attending Georgetown University Law Center, Professor Oliva earned a masters in business administration at Balliol College, Oxford University. She was elected as a Rhodes and Truman Scholar while a cadet at the United States Military Academy at West Point. Subsequent to attending law school, Professor Oliva served as a federal appellate law clerk to the Honorable Stephanie K. Seymour on the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit and the Honorable Thomas L. Ambro on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. Professor Oliva is a United States Army veteran and admitted to the bar in Delaware, California, the District of Columbia, and West Virginia. She also is admitted to numerous United States district and appellate courts, including the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims and the United States Supreme Court. Professor Oliva's professional memberships include the American Bar Association (ABA), American Health Lawyers Association (AHLA), American Society of Law, Medicine & Ethics (ASLME), National Organization of Veterans Advocates (NOVA), and National Law School Veterans Clinic Consortium (NLSVCC). Her work has been published by or is forthcoming in the Northwestern Law Review, the George Mason Law Review, The Conversation, and the Oxford Human Rights Hub.
Current Work:
Professor Oliva's research focuses on health care law and policy and the law of evidence. Her experience as a healthcare litigator — with extensive experience in disability, mental and behavior health, products liability, and toxic tort litigation — a regulatory enforcement attorney, and an Army Military Police officer inform and motivate her research agenda. Professor Oliva's scholarship advances legislative, regulatory, and evidentiary legal reforms aimed to improve access to effective, evidence-based healthcare treatment for individuals too frequently excluded by the American healthcare system and too frequently targeted by the police, polluters, and politicians. Those excluded individuals include our neighbors living in poverty and proximate to industrial waste sites and other environmental hazards, particularly in rural communities, and those suffering substance abuse, behavioral, and mental health-related disorders.
Research Area Keyword(s):
Public health, evidence, expert evidence, healthcare benefits, veterans
