Health Sciences clinical Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Urology
UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine
Los Angeles, California, United States
I came to UCLA in 1975 to be the third woman to complete the Obstetrics and Gynecology residency. We had a strong Urogynecology program although it was not an identified field everywhere. I was advised a woman could not be an oncologist by one of my faculty and so went into general OB GYN practice for 10 years. I missed surgery and specifically felt my training and background in Urogynecology was better then the local urologists in town and so determined some extra training in the field would be optimal. I took off a few months, spent time with Dr. Ostergard in Long Beach and Dr. Susan Tucker at UNC. She taught me neurourology and VUDS. I joined AUGS, collaborated with a UCLA trained Urologist and started a Continence Center to perform UDS, biofeedback and other specialized treatment. In 1998 I began teaching Urogynecology fellows in the Harbor UCLA Fellowship. After returning to the full tme faculty at UCLA we combined our Gynecology and Urology programs with Drs. Victor Nitti and Christopher Tarnay into a a fully integrated URPS program where I remain.
At AUGS I met a mentor, Dr. Deb Myers chair of a committee I served on.
I was then asked By Conrad Sweeting to start an AUGS Foundation. It took 3 years to get it off the ground but we have a Foundation with an endowment that funds research. I then served on the Board of Directors, and then with more mentoring from Matt Barber, Dee Fenner, Peggy Norton, Becky Rogers and all those who served before me became President of AUGS in 2015. We moved from a society managed by a large company to self management, and we dealt a blow to the CMS rule to bundle all of our vaginal surgeries into vaginal hysterectomy coding.
Welcome Address and Award Presentations
Wednesday, October 23, 2024
1:00 PM – 1:30 PM EDT
Disclosure information not submitted.