Course Chair
Robert B. Baron, MD, MS
Director, UCSF Osher Mini Medical School for the Public;
Professor of Medicine; Associate Dean, Graduate and Continuing Medical Education
Course Description
What makes a world-class physician or scientist decide to write a book for the wide world of readers? Where do they find the inspiration and the time? What do they hope to accomplish? How do the satisfactions of writing compare to practicing medicine or writing scholarly articles?
This innovative course will ask these questions and more of six recently published UCSF authors. In discussing their books, our UCSF experts will discuss several of today's most important health and health policy issues. Topics include patients and caregivers living well with serious illness; the potential overuse of medical care and when to say "enough"; the impact of technology and the digital revolution on health and health care; the impact of AIDS in San Francisco through the eyes of three fictional doctors; the consequences of hazardous manufacturing and poisonous materials on public health; and the role of the pharmaceutical industry in creating a new disease, short stature, to sell new a medication.
Please join UCSF Professors Steve Pantilat, Sharon Kaufman, Robert Wachter, Mark Jacobson, Paul Blanc, and Aimee Medeiros for this unique series of conversations!
Course Topics
Lecture Schedule
Download Program at a Glance (.pdf)
Download the Flyer (.pdf)
April 27, 2017 | Download Slides
Author: Mark Jacobson, MD
Professor of Medicine, Emeritus (Active), Division of HIV, Infectious Diseases, and Global Medicine
University of California San Francisco
Book in Discussion: Sensing Light
Interviewer: Susa Coffey, MD
Professor of Medicine,
Division of HIV, Infectious Diseases, and Global Medicine
University of California San Francisco
May 11, 2017
Author: Aimee Medeiros, PhD
Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, History, and Social Medicine
University of California, San Francisco
Book in Discussion: Heightened Expectations: The Rise of the Human Growth Hormone Industry in America
Interviewer: Elena Conis, PhD
Writer and historian of medicine, public health, and the environment.
Professor of Journalism, University of California Berkley
May 18, 2017
Author: Paul D. Blanc, MD, MSPH
Professor of Medicine
Endowed Chair and Division Chief, Occupational and Environmental Medicine
University of California, San Francisco
Book in Discussion: Fake Silk: The Lethal History of Viscose Rayon (Yale University Press, 2016)
Interviewer: Professor Peter Stansky, PhD
Frances and Charles Field Professor of History, Emeritus
Stanford University, Stanford, CA
May 25, 2017
Author: Sharon Kaufman, PhD
Chair, Department of Anthropology, History and Social Medicine
University of California San Francisco
Book in Discussion: Ordinary Medicine: Extraordinary Treatments, Longer Lives and Where to Draw the Line
Interviewer: Dawn M. Gross, MD, PhD, FAAHPM
Attending Physician
UCSF Palliative Care Service
University of California San Francisco
Writer and radio host of Dying To Talk on 91.7 FM KALW
June 1, 2017
Author: Robert M. Wachter, MD
Professor and Chair, Department of Medicine
Holly Smith Distinguished Professor in Science and Medicine
Marc and Lynne Benioff Endowed Chair
University of California, San Francisco
Book in Discussion: The Digital Doctor: Hope, Hype and Harm at the Dawn of Medicine's Computer Age
Interviewer: Katie Hafner
New York Times journalist and author
June 8, 2017
Author: Steven Pantilat, MD
Professor of Medicine
Kates-Burnard and Hellman Distinguished Professor in Palliative Care;
Director, UCSF Palliative Care Program
University of California, San Francisco
Book in Discussion: Life After the Diagnosis: Expert Advice on Living Well with Serious Illness for Patients and Caregivers
Interviewer: Katie Hafner
New York Times journalist and author