News & Events

  Visit the Parenting in Surgery website   Annie having a great time at the Mentorship event. Becoming a parent is hard work, especially when balancing the new role as a parent with surgical training. We have created a New Parent Mentorship Program in the UCSF Department of Surgery to provide a support network of trainees and faculty. The Mentorship program was successfully launched with a social gathering at Spark Social SF. The event included a kid's play area, an abundance of food, and the opportunity for medical students, trainees, faculty, and their families to meet, mingle, and [...]

We are pleased to announce that Johannes Kratz, MD has been selected as UCSF's first Medical Director of Robotic Surgery. Johannes has served as co-Director of the UCSF Health Robotic Executive committee from 2018-2022 and in 2022 became sole director of the same. Under his careful stewardship, robotic surgeries have grown year over year adding additional service lines and placing UCSF at the forefront of technological innovation in the use of robotic technology in surgery. Johannes has led the development of a robotics dashboard tracking both volume and key performance indicators important [...]

The UCSF Department of Sugery is very pleased to introduce our new General Surgery, Plastic Surgery, and Integrated Vascular Surgery residents! We warmly welcome this extraordinary, diverse group to UCSF Surgery and congratulate each incoming intern for matching into our programs. We are honored to partner with these future surgeons as they begin their training in June, and are thrilled that they will be joining the UCSF Surgery family.

Each year INTERLINK identifies the nation's top-performing transplant programs through our Performance Model Program. Their analytical approach has identified University of California SanFrancisco Medical Center as INTERLINK's #1 performing program for lung transplantation in their Programs of Excellence network. In recognition of this outstanding performance, INTERLINK is presenting them with the 2023 Chairman's Award for transplant excellence. Please join us in congratulating the UCSF Health, Lung Transplant program for their excellent performance!  

SOURCE: TODAY Dr. Amy Fiedler was finishing up a standard heart transplant surgery in December — putting the dressings on the patient and getting ready to transport her the intensive care unit — when she noticed something she'd never seen before. The room was entirely women. Behind all the surgical masks and gear, she saw the perfusionist (who runs the heart-lung machine), the nursing staff and even the patient were all female.  Dr. Charlene Blake, cardiac anesthesiologist, Fatou Gaye, Dr. Amy Fiedler, cardiac surgeon, and Ashley Risso, perfusionist, outside of UCSF. Courtesy [...]

The 2022 Bay Area Heart Walk is this Friday, September 16th at the Embarcadero Plaza in San Francisco. UCSF has set a goal to have 150 walkers raising $50,000. Register here 2022 Bay Area CA Heart Walk: UCSF Medical Center - Heart Walk - American Heart Association. Join your our Advanced Heart Failure Comprehensive Center Team with Jason Smith, MD and Amy Fiedler, MD!

Andrew Wisneski, MD, recent General Surgery Residency graduate class of 2022 and first -year Thoracic Surgery Resident won the Lawrence W. Way Critical Thinking Award. The Lawrence W. Way Critical Thinking Award, chosen by faculty only, recognizes the chief resident who has demonstrated a notable ability to critically interpr et and apply current medical concepts to the care of each patient. The award is named in honor of Dr. Way, Professor Emeritus, and was established in 2013.

Melissa H. Coleman, MD accepted a new Medical Leadership position and is now the Director of UCSF Medicine's Clinical Immersive Experiences (CIEx).  CIExes are elective opportunities meant for career exploration or skills building in areas of clinical interest. Medical students will have six 2-week blocks during which they will participate in three to four 2-week CIExes. Committed to medical education, Dr. Coleman also serves as the associate program director for the Thoracic Surgery Residency Program and has won numerous teaching awards. Dr. Coleman is board certified in Thoracic Surgery [...]

Featured Video: "Day in the Life of a UCSF heart surgeon: Dr. Tom Nguyen"Follow along on a typical day with UCSF Medical Center cardiac surgeon Dr. Tom Nguyen who is the chief of the Division of Adult Cardiothoracic Surgery, UCSF Department of Surgery. To learn more about Dr. Nguyen on UCSFHealth, visit: https://www.ucsfhealth.org/providers/dr-tom-nguyenTo read Dr. Nguyen's bio on the Department of Surgery, click here.

Innovation Means Shorter Hospital Stays, Fewer Complications Cardiothoracic surgeons at UC San Francisco have performed the first robotically assisted mitral value surgery in San Francisco. The surgery was recently performed on a 63-year-old patient who had mitral valve prolapse. Mitral valve surgery is performed when the heart's mitral valve needs to be repaired. Traditionally, mitral valve surgery required opening the chest and putting the patient on heart-lung bypass to keep blood circulating during surgery. Since 2016, UCSF surgeons have been performing minimally invasive mitral valve [...]

Recording Break Month! In June, we've had our busiest month yet! Our Heart Transplant team performed six heart transplants beween June 1 and June 30! Give thanks and save Lives! Be an organ donor! Register here. 

Amy G. Fiedler, M.D., will be joining our faculty as a Cardiac Surgeon and Assistant Professor of Clinical Surgery in the Department of Surgery. Dr. Fiedler comes to UCSF from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where her clinical practice is focused in heart failure and transplantation and mechanical circulatory support. Dr. Fielder is a graduate of Georgetown University, where she received both her Bachelor of Science in Biology and her Master's degree in Microbiology and Immunology. For medical school, Dr. Fiedler attended The George Washington University and completed both her general [...]

Dr. Jason Smith, a native of San Francisco, has joined our department as a Professor of Clinical Surgery and as the Surgical Director of Heart Failure and Mechanical Circulatory Support. He is a cardiac surgeon with experience in ischemic and valvular heart disease, complex aortic surgery, endocarditis, and complex re-operative surgery. His primary career focus is on the surgical management of heart failure, cardiac transplant, and mechanical circulatory support.  In heart transplantation, Dr. Smith has been involved in increasing access to heart transplants through improving donor [...]

We are delighted to announce that Barbara C.S. Hamilton, M.D.,M.A.S. will join the Division of Adult Cardiothoracic Surgery as a Clinical Instructor starting March 1st, 2022. Dr. Hamilton completed her undergraduate work at McGill University, where she majored in music, followed by additional training at the prestigious Manhattan School of Music. She earned a Master of Music in Jazz Performance. After graduating, Dr. Hamilton stayed in Manhattan to work as a freelance musician and ultimately obtained her medical degree at Columbia University. She then came to UCSF to complete her training in [...]

Dr. Melissa H. Coleman is one of the seventh faculty members in the UCSF Department of Surgery to receive the Haile T. Debas Academy of Medical Educator's Excellence in Teaching Award 2021. The Haile T. Debas Academy of Medical Educators is dedicated to creating an environment that enhances the status of teachers at UCSF, promotes and rewards teaching excellence, fosters curricular innovation, and encourages scholarship in medical education.  The Academy's Excellence in Teaching Awards are peer-nominated and recognize the many "front-line" faculty members who are involved in teaching [...]

We are delighted to announce that Dr. Marko Boskovski joined our faculty as an assistant professor of surgery in the Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery. Dr. Boskovski received his BA in physics at Washington University in St. Louis and his MD and MHS at the Yale University School of Medicine. He relocated to Boston to complete his General Surgery Residency and Cardiothoracic Surgery Fellowship at the Brigham and Women's Hospital. During his residency, he attended the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and received his MPH and also completed a Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship at [...]

Welcome to Dr. Laura Scrimgeour, our new thoracic surgery fellow, to the Division of Adult Cardiothoracic Surgery! Dr. Scrimgeour earned her medical degree from the University of Colorado School of Medicine in 2014. Recently, she has completed her general surgery training at Brown University Providence in Rhode Island.   Early in her career, Dr. Scrimgeour published 14 peer-reviewed articles. Dr. Scrimgeour was also a fellow for the prestigious NIH NIGMS T32 grant.  Dr. Scrimgeour received numerous research awards and scholarships for her accomplishments.  Dr. Scrimgeour trained as a [...]

Melissa H. Coleman, MD, was the one of the eight recipients of the John A. Watson Faculty Scholar, the Dean's Diversity Fund. This diversity grant is named after John A. Watson, PhD, a pioneer for diversity, an inspiring mentor, and a tenacious scientist. During his tenure as dean of admissions in the 1970s, he rapidly increased the number of women and minority students in the entering medical school classes.  Dr. Coleman is an assistant professor of surgery and the associate program director of the UCSF Thoracic Surgery Residency Program. She is committed to fostering a culture of [...]

In recognition of Melissa H. Coleman, M.D.'s professionalism, excellence, dedication, and contribution to the teaching of the Thoracic Surgery Residents, Dr. Coleman was selected to be the recipient of the UCSF Thoracic Surgery Residency Program Teaching Award for FY19-20. Coleman earned her medical degree from the Weill Cornell Medical College at Cornell University. Subsequently, Coleman completed her General Surgery Residency followed by a Surgical Critical Care and Clinical Nutrition Fellowship at Brigham and Women's Hospital of Harvard University in 2014, 2015, 2016 respectively. In [...]

Since the first community-transmission of Covid-19 was identified in the United States on February 26, 2020,1 the medical community has experienced an upheaval like never before. Looking to the experiences abroad, urgent steps were taken to reduce surgical cases and preserve inpatient capacity for a potential surge of Covid-19 patients.2 Many patients in need of nonurgent but essential surgical care were delayed those services. At the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), we recognized the need to avoid adverse outcomes associated with delaying much-needed cancer, cardiovascular, [...]