Core Hospitals

Ronald Reagan UCLA Health Center

The Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center is a new (opened on June 29, 2008) state-of-the-art hospital with 520 inpatient beds. The hospital is among the top ranked medical centers in the Nation, and features a full range of services across all areas of medicine. It is widely considered to be among the most technically advanced hospitals in the world. Fellows on the GI service manage all consults at the medical center along with a GI faculty member. The cases are often complex. Hemostasis cases, in particular, can be challenging and unlike cases at community-based hospitals. Given the number and complexity of hemostasis cases, the Medical Center features a dedicated Hemostasis Service, directed by Dr. Dennis Jensen, that is comprised of several internationally-recognized faculty who are experts in the management of gastrointestinal hemorrhage. Fellows work side-by-side with this team for all inpatient bleeding cases, and therefore receive unprecedented experience in the management of complex hemostasis cases. This service also operates through the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center, described below. The Hepatology and Liver Transplant service is one of the busiest of its kind in the Nation. Fellows rotating on hepatology at the medical center benefit from the wide variety of both general and transplant hepatology patients available at this hospital. Faculty in hepatology have strong interests in liver transplantation and outcomes research, hepatocellular carcinoma, viral hepatitis, and fatty liver / metabolic syndrome. Other renowned research centers here include Small Bowel Diseases, UCLA Center for Neurobiology of Stress, Gene Therapy, and the center for HIV and Digestive Diseases. In addition to the Friday morning seminar series, fellows rotating here attend three other core weekly conferences: Clinical Conference (Weds), GI pathology (Thursday), GI journal club (Friday). GI pathology is a strength at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center with a dedicated GI biopsy lab started by Drs. Wilfred Weinstein and Klaus Lewin. GI pathology fellows are available year round for biopsy review.

West Los Angeles Veteran’s Healthcare System

The VA Greater Los Angeles Health Care System (700 beds) has long been known for its basic and clinical research programs in gastroenterology. Fellows receive exposure to a wide variety of gastroenterology and hepatology disorders, and gain experience in the full range of luminal and biliary procedures. GI faculty at the VA actively work at CURE: Digestive Disease Research Center, a research center with central interests in signal transduction, gastrointestinal cancers, peptic ulcer diseases, gastrointestinal peptides, and neuroenteric control of gastrointestinal secretion and motility as well as endoscopic research. The VA also houses the Center for Outcomes Research and Education, which focuses health services research in digestive disorders. Fellows working through this Center receive unique opportunities to blend health services methods (e.g. database analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, meta-analysis, quality improvement, surveys, clincal trials) with GI and hepatology interests. Fellows rotating through the VA participate in the Friday morning core curriculum series, as well as weekly medical-surgical and pathology review conferences. Separate hepatology clinics round out the experience in addition to general gastroenterology. They also attend the Wednesday clinical conference and the Friday GI journal club at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.

Cedars-Sinai Medical Center

Cedars-Sinai Medical Center is an 800 bed, UCLA-affiliated, tertiary care community hospital. The IBD Center at Cedars-Sinai is recognized as an international center of excellence in clinical and basic research in IBD. A large patient population and support staff facilitate many investigator-initiated and pharmaceutical company studies that are at the cutting edge of IBD therapeutics. Dr. Targan has an NIH program and ROL grants that examine unique aspects of intestinal lymphocyte signaling, genetics, and serologic markers in IBD. The GI Motility program at Cedars-Sinai is a model for translational gastroenterology research. Basic and clinical research projects explore the specific pathogenic mechanisms underlying common disorders in GI motility across the length of the GI Tract. Translational research projects investigate novel therapeutic approaches in the management of these disorders. Cedars-Sinai also has a busy inpatient and outpatient Hepatology service with an active liver transplant program. Faculty clinical research includes cytokine-directed therapy for alcoholic hepatitis, novel anti-viral therapies and autoimmune hepatitis. Faculty research interests reflect the strengths of IBD, GI motility, and hepatology at this hospital.
After the first year of fellowship, GI fellows in the UCLA Training Program can elect to rotate to the following affiliated hospital settings to broaden their knowledge of inpatient and outpatient consultative gastroenterology and endoscopic technique.

Affiliated Hospitals

Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center

One of the two hospital campuses of the UCLA Health System, Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center and Orthopaedic Hospital features outstanding clinical programs for GI fellows. A new clinical rotation for post-first year GI fellows is beginning in academic year 2008-2009. This rotation allows our Fellows to manage inpatient and outpatient consults in the context of a busy, University-based, secondary care community hospital.

UCLA-Harbor Medical Center

The Harbor-UCLA Medical Center is a county hospital complex in Torrance, California, which has been affiliated with the UCLA School of Medicine since the 1960's. It serves a population of two million people that includes the broadest possible mix of ethnic and socio-economic groups. The GI Service at Harbor is also closely associated with Pediatric Gastroenterology which allows first-hand experience in a diagnosis and treatment of pediatric patients with GI disease. Harbor-UCLA is Nationally recognized for its excellence in biliary endoscopy and endoscopic ultrasound programs, and Fellows have extensive opportunities to learn about cutting edge technologies in this burgeoning field of gastroenterology.

Olive View-UCLA Medical Center

The Olive View Program is housed in the 250-bed Olive View-UCLA Medical Center in Sylmar, California and has been operational since 1987. The Olive View experience stresses independent critical thinking and personal responsibility. The focus of the educational experience is on using clinical skills and judgment in conjunction with information from the literature to make medical decisions. Fellows benefit from excellent teaching, hand-on experience in all aspects of consult management, and a wide varitety of patients with oftentimes advanced disease.