Cynthia R. L. Webster | BS, DVM, DACVIM

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• Professor
• Associate Chair of Research

Dr. Cynthia Webster is an expert in canine and feline liver disease and a board-certified small animal medicine internist. At the Cummings School, she leads the veterinary Liver Study Group, an umbrella organization of the Comparative Gastroenterology Society. Her research interests include how the liver regulates its ability to survive after toxic insults, especially during times when bile flow is attenuated.

Dr. Webster grew up in a small town in western Massachusetts. She says she was drawn to comparative medicine so that she could one day not only care for dogs and cats, but also solve problems in human medicine. After attending Cornell University’s veterinary school and doing post-graduate work in liver disease at Tufts University School of Medicine, Dr. Webster now has a joint appointment that allows her to do just that: she teaches gastrointestinal and liver pharmacology, pathology and medicine to DVM students at the Cummings School and lectures graduate students at Tufts Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences in Boston.

It is hard to not be a great doctor in this environment, Dr. Webster says of the Cummings School. At the Foster Hospital for Small Animals, you have so many brilliant minds to work with and experts in every discipline. I love being able to do biomedical research one day, work with owners and their pets the next, and through it all still have the ability to train the next generation of veterinarians.

Dr. Webster lives in Grafton with her husband and son. She is active in the Grafton public schools and organizes Tufts’ outreach efforts—ranging from science lectures to career days. She admits to being a cat lady and has two cats at home she adores.

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Education

• BS, Simmons College, 1987
• DVM, Cornell University , 1985
• House Officer Training, ACVIM Small Animal Medicine - TCSVM

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Board Certifications

• American College of Veterinary Internal Medicine (ACVIM)

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Research Activities

General Research

• Cholestatic liver disease in dogs and cats, coagulation in liver disease dogs and cats, copper associated and immune mediated chronic hepatitis in dogs, cholangitis in cats
• Animal based engineering and science challenges in K-12

Selected Research Projects

• Pathophysiology of cholestatic liver disease in dogs and cats
• Assessment of bleeding and thrombotic risk in dogs and cats with cholestatic liver disease
• Biomarkers in liver disease in dogs and cats
• Coagulation and liver disease.

Research and Clinical Interests

• Molecular mechanisms of pathogenesis in cholestatic liver disease.
• Diagnosis and therapeutic intervention in canine and feline cholestatic liver disease.
• Human-animal interaction in motivation and identity in STEM careers in middle school children

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