Dr. Joyce Adams has been involved in the medical evaluation of suspected sexual abuse since 1984, first as the director of the Sexual Abuse Evaluation Program at the University of Kansas Medical Center, and then at Valley Medical Center in Fresno, California. During her career, she has examined over 3,000 children for suspected child sexual abuse, and has reviewed records and colposcopic photographs on approximately 6,000 more.

Dr. Adams has published extensively in the field of medical evaluation of suspected sexual abuse, including papers on agreement among examiners on normal vs. abnormal genital findings, a survey of examiners on the interpretation of findings, the development and continuing revision of a medical literature-based tool for interpreting medical findings in suspected sexual abuse, a study of the frequency of abnormal findings in legally confirmed cases of sexual abuse, a study of findings in sexually abused adolescent girls, and a study of the appearance of the hymen in adolescent girls who have not been abused or had sexual intercourse. She also speaks regularly at national and international meetings on topics of sexual abuse and adolescent gynecology, and is active as an expert witness in child sexual abuse cases nationwide.

Dr. Adams has been active in the American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children, the North American Society for Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology, and in the American Academy of Pediatrics Section on Child Abuse and Neglect, where she was an elected member of the Executive Committee for two years. She is also a member of an honorary society for physicians involved in the field of child maltreatment, the Ray E. Helfer Society. Dr. Adams is also Board Eligible in the newly recognized subspecialty of Child Abuse Pediatrics and sat for the first qualifying examination in November of 2009.

Currently, Dr. Adams is a Professor of Clinical Pediatrics in the Division of Primary Care Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine at UCSD. She is involved in teaching, clinical care, and research in several settings, including the Chadwick Center for Children and Families at Rady Children’s Hospital of San Diego. Dr. Adams also acts as a consultant for the Sexual Abuse Response Team and Child Abuse Program at Palomar and Pomerado Hospitals in San Diego County.