“Takeaway from Berkeley: Holding one’s knowledge lightly and being willing to listen to the perspectives of others.”
Robert A. Hiatt MD, PhD ’80, MPH ’72 is a professor and immediate past chair of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at UCSF and the associate director of population sciences for the Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center. He was the first deputy director of the National Cancer Institute’s Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (1998-2003), where he oversaw the extramural cancer epidemiology, health services research, and surveillance programs.
On public health and the challenges we face
Public health, or population health as many are calling it these days, takes the perspective of multilevel determinants of societal health. I believe a major challenge is to break down the traditional separation between public health and individual health care to understand how they are necessarily integrated.
“Berkeley moment”
Len Syme’s challenges to what I thought I believed.
A change to one U.S. policy that would transform public health
Add a single payer health system. Eliminates waste and gets everyone working on the same team.
