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Iris Cantor - UCLA Women’s Health Center

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  • Leichtman-Levine-TEM Summer Mentorship
  • Women's Health Pilot Project Awardees
  • Leichtman-Levine-TEM Summer Mentorship
  • Women's Health Pilot Project Awardees
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Leichtman-Levine-TEM Summer Mentorship

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Leichtman-Levine-TEM Summer Mentorship in Women's Health Research at the
Iris Cantor-UCLA Women's Health Center

Thanks to a generous commitment from Executive Advisory Board member Lauren Leichtman and her husband Arthur Levine, in 2018 the Iris Cantor-UCLA Women’s Health Center began to offer mentored summer research opportunities for students at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. This program will enhance the Center’s ability to perform research as well as provide guidance to the next generation of women’s health researchers. Students will receive support to complete research, present their results, and network regionally and nationally with experts in women’s health. Summer research positions are available for first-year medical students at the David Geffen School of Medicine. The student experience includes:

  • Mentorship in how a research plan is developed

  • Assistance in completing an application for summer research support from the Short Term Training Program (STTP), Internal Medicine Chief's Fellowship, or other source of summer research support. (Students must obtain support from STTP, the Internal Medicine Chief’s Fellowship, or other DGSOM authorized source of support to participate)

  • Tutoring in relevant design and analysis methods

  • Hands on training in the use of statistical packages

  • Structured research meetings throughout the summer research project

  • Practicum in oral presentation of research results

  • Clinical shadowing of a women's health provider at the Iris Cantor-UCLA Women's Health Center during the summer

  • Guidance and assistance in developing a poster for the Josiah Brown Research Fair

  • Continued support to submit results in abstract, presentation, or paper form

  • Up to $1,500 in financial support for travel expenses should the project be accepted to be presented at a national research meeting

2021 Announcement (PDF)

Applications for 2021 are OPEN

Research Director / PI

Gail Greendale, Research Director  
Gail Greendale, M.D.
Professor of Medicine and Obstetrics and Gynecology, David Geffen School of Medicine
Lauren B. Leichtman and Arthur E. Levine Endowed Chair in Women’s Health Research


Associate Research Director/ PI

Andrea Hevener 
Andrea Hevener, PhD 
 Professor of Medicine (Endocrinology), David Geffen School of Medicine

Senior Mentors

Gail Greendale, Research Director  
Kimberly Narain, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H.
Assistant Professor-in-Residence, David Geffen School of Medicine


  
Teresa Seeman, PhD
Professor of Epidemiology, Fielding School of Public Health and Medicine (Geriatrics) 
Heather McCreath, PhD
Researcher, Division of Geriatrics, UCLA Department of Medicine Coordination and Evaluation Center, Diversity Program Consortium 


Current Student Researchers

Aishwarya Karlapudi  
Aishwarya Karlapudi
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA 
Class of 2023

Aishwarya Karlapudi is a medical student, in the Class of 2023, at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. Originally from Phoenix, Arizona, she is an alumna of the University of Arizona. Aishwarya first became interested in women’s health after witnessing a loved one navigate the unique health disparities that women face when it comes to post-operative pain perception, assessment, and treatment. After working with Population Connection Action Fund on the Fight4HER campaign for women's reproductive rights for two years, Aishwarya seeks to explore research as another way to contribute to the health and well-being of women in her community. Through the Leichtman-Levine-TEM Summer Mentorship program, Aishwarya hopes to develop skills in project design, big data-set analysis, and critical thinking. She is interested in specialties that involve longitudinal relationships such as OB/GYN and primary care, and she looks forward to this opportunity to learn more about women's health. With mentorship throughout the project, Aishwarya hopes to gain the necessary skills to become the physician, researcher, and advocate she envisions for herself and her community.

Rocio Garcia Martinez  
Rocio Garcia Martinez
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA 
Class of 2023

Rocio grew up in Los Angeles and expressed a strong interest in medicine at a young age. She is motivated to work with underserved communities and is passionate about diversity in healthcare leadership. She is pursuing a Doctor of Medicine degree from Charles R Drew University/UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine. She is expected to graduate from medical school in 2023. Prior to attending medical school, Rocio completed the RAP Program at UCLA DGSOM in 2018. She received a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Psychology from California State University Northridge in 2014 and graduated from Grant High School in the San Fernando Valley. In college, Rocio expressed an interest in education and gained teaching experience by partnering with Peer Health Exchange and Keep Youth Doing Something.  While completing her post-baccalaureate program, she worked full-time as a middle school teacher at The Valley Schools in the San Fernando Valley. This experience emphasized her interest in utilizing education to improve the health of underserved communities. From a young age, Rocio demonstrated a passion for the performing arts and continues to attend dance lessons. She is a member of Cheer Los Angeles, a non-profit organization in Culver City that raises funds and resources for LGBTQ+ communities.

Sedina Dzodzomenyo  
Sedina Dzodzomenyo
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA 
Class of 2023

Sedina Dzodzomenyo is a student in the Class of 2023, originally from Columbus, Ohio. Her interest in women's health stems from questions about the ways in which socially constructed, gendered expectations and behaviors affect providers' communication of health information to their female patients, those patients' understanding of and receptiveness towards that information, and their overall health outcomes. This summer, she is looking forward to learning how to develop a rigorous framework for asking and answering questions relevant to women's health. Additionally, she is excited to gain valuable technical skills in data analysis that will be transferable to future research. She is currently considering specialties with a strong focus on women's health, including urogynecology, OB-GYN, and internal medicine.

Previous Student Researchers

 Yadira Bribiesca
Yadira Bribiesca
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA 
Class of 2023
TEM Scholarship Recipient

Yadira Bribiesca is a first year medical student in the UCLA PRIME-LA (MD/Masters) Program.  Yadira’s commitment to medicine stems from her family’s and her personal struggle to access equitable health care in South Los Angeles. As part of the PRIME-LA program, she along with her peers, have partnered up with the Department of Public Health to understand the barriers to exercise for women in SPA 6, and use this information to help implement the Parks Rx Program in LA County.  Mentorship has been pivotal in her journey to medical school and thus Yadira hopes to pay it forward. She is part of the mentorship team with the Latino Medical Student Association. As a DACA recipient and first-generation college student, Yadira aspires to use her dual degree to engage in policy change and conduct research in underserved communities to fervently fight against health inequities. She is looking forward to gaining skills in statistically analyzing and manipulating big data sets in hopes of finding correlates that can potentially affect positive change in underserved women’s health.

Karen Bryan 
Karen Bryan
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA 
Class of 2022

Karen Bryan is originally from the Bay Area, California. Karen was drawn to this focused research and mentorship program because she is passionate about women’s healthcare and is excited to explore those interests further through research and clinical exposure. She was lucky to grow up surrounded by strong female role models like her mother and grandmother, who instilled in her a value for advocating for women. Karen is interested in pursuing a career in OBGyn or Internal Medicine, and she looks forward to this opportunity to delve deeper into important topics in women’s health. She hopes to gain valuable research experience which will aid in her future practice to help her better understand the pressing issues facing women’s health today and how to address them as a clinician.

Aloukika Shah 
Aloukika Shah
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA 
Class of 2022

Aloukika is originally from Northern California. Aloukika’s interest in women’s health was piqued after witnessing a loved one’s challenging experience though the menopausal transition. Understanding how truly unique women’s healthcare must be in order to meet the multidimensional needs of women, makes this a patient population she hopes to one day serve. Prior to medical school, Aloukika served as an AmeriCorps Health Fellow at a federally qualified health center where she witnessed the pervasive role of nutrition among many other lifestyle components underlying chronic disease. Her experience managing her clinic’s wellness center and leading classes in cooking and chronic disease management inspires her to pursue a career with longitudinal care of patients such as internal medicine. Aloukika looks forward to this targeted research mentorship as a valuable opportunity to build a foundation for both clinical research and critical thinking, two skills that she will continue to develop through her medical training and beyond.
Alexander Chen  
Alexander Chen
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA 
Class of 2021

Originally from Richmond, California, Alex Chen first became interested in nutrition and health after volunteering as an undergraduate tutor with the Yale Undergraduate Prison Project. While teaching in correctional facilities, Alex saw firsthand the effects nutrition can have on the health of different populations; this experience sparked an interest that has continued at UCLA DGSOM. In the future, Alex hopes to pursue an academic career in general internal medicine. Part of that goal is providing the best possible clinical care, something that he believes this fellowship will be crucial for – in terms of building a better academic and clinical understanding of 50% of his future patients, building a foundation of clinical research skills, and fostering the curiosity and critical thinking it takes to go from research questions to patient decision-making.

Eden Patton  
Eden Patton
David Geffen School of Medicine/Charles R. Drew University of Medicine & Science
Class of 2022

Eden Patton is a first year medical student in the UCLA/Charles R. Drew Medical Education Program and PRIME (MD/Masters) Program. Eden was inspired to get into medicine after watching her mother struggle to receive appropriate quality healthcare due to their rural location. By obtaining a dual degree, Eden hopes to create and advocate for policy change that improves healthcare access for women in underserved communities. She looks forward to the research and mentorship she will be receiving to learn how to most effectively obtain and quantify information that can be instrumental in benefiting women’s healthcare.

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