The University of California has awarded four grants totaling $2.5 million to scale up proposals that have shown potential to improve health care while delivering a return on investment to UC medical centers. The grants will go to UC Health projects that include projects to reduce emergency room visits among psychiatric patients, expand access to specialty care, develop a tobacco cessation network and support efforts to standardize treatment for hip and knee replacements.
Five UCLA faculty members are participating in two of these projects.
Drs. Erick Cheung and Lynne McCullough will work on a project that seeks to reduce the dependency of psychiatric patients on emergency services. Dr. Cheung is a psychiatrist at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center and also works with the Stewart and Lynda Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital at UCLA. Dr. McCullough works in emergency medicine at the medical center.
Drs. Allison Diamant and Timothy Fong , as well Linda Sarna, professor at the UCLA School of Nursing and an oncology nurse, will all be contributing to the expansion of services offered to UC faculty, staff and students to help reduce or eliminate tobacco dependency. Dr. Diamant is an internal medicine specialist at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center and UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica. Dr. Fong specializes in psychiatry at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center and the Stewart and Lynda Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital at UCLA. Sarna is internationally recognized for her work with promoting nursing involvement in tobacco control and in oncology nursing research focused on quality of life and symptoms of patients with lung cancer.
