Chief Medical Officer
Los Angeles Coutny + University of Southern California
Dr. Spellberg is Chief Medical Officer at the Los Angeles County-University of Southern California (LAC+USC) Medical Center. He is also Medical Director of Biosciences for Los Angeles County. He received his BA in Molecular Cell Biology-Immunology from UC Berkeley. He then attended medical school at UCLA, where he received numerous academic honors, including serving as the UCLA AOA Chapter Co-President, and winning the prestigious Stafford Warren award for the topic academic performance in his graduating class. Dr. Spellberg completed his Residency in Internal Medicine and subspecialty fellowship in Infectious Diseases at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center.
Dr. Spellberg has extensive administrative, patient care, and teaching activities. He has worked for the last 6 years to transform the quality and efficiency of care delivered at LAC+USC Medical Center, one of the largest public hospitals in the US. Dr. Spellberg may be the only Chief Medical Officer in the US who not only continues to be actively clinically, staffing both Internal Medicine ward teams and Infectious Diseases consulting service, but also maintains an active NIH-funded basic science laboratory. His NIH-funded research interests are diverse, ranging from basic immunology and vaccinology, to pure clinical and outcomes research, to process improvement work related to delivery of care, focusing on safety net hospitals. Dr. Spellberg has also co-founded 3 biotechnology start up companies.
Finally, at the national level, Dr. Spellberg has worked extensively to attempt to bring attention to the problems of increasing drug resistance and decreasing new antibiotics, and is now working to raise attention to the need for national healthcare reform. He has testified before Congress and participated in numerous national meetings on antibiotic resistant superbugs and how to combat them, and has appeared in numerous media outlets discussing this issue. In 2009, he published the book Rising Plague to inform and educate the public about the crisis in antibiotic resistant infections and lack of antibiotic development. His latest book, Broken, Bankrupt, and Dying: How to Solve the Great American Healthcare Rip-Off, was published in June of 2020.
Disclosure: Nothing to disclose
Wednesday, October 14, 2020
6:00pm – 8:00pm EDT