Explore Family
Medicine Research

Addressing Clinical Questions that Benefit the Community 

At UC San Diego’s Department of Family Medicine, we believe strongly that research is most useful when it addresses current clinical questions, helps direct resources to those who would benefit the most, and critically evaluates the benefits as well as possible costs of intervention. Therefore our efforts for the last decade have been not only on rigorous randomized controlled trials, but also on quality improvement projects that can be implemented and continued in practice independent of outside research funding. We assess the true impact of our educational efforts, examine how best to integrate research findings into our clinics and practices, and critically examine how our care best results in optimal outcomes.

Promoting Continuous Improvement in Health Care

We invite patients and research investigators to collaborate on designing projects that will have maximal impact on scientific and clinical communities, as well as patient populations. In ways that protect patient privacy, we examine information collected as part of routine clinical care at UC San Diego to uncover patterns of best practices in treatment and achievement of outcomes that promotes continuous improvement in our delivery of health care.

In the Department of Family Medicine, we conduct ongoing evaluation of the care we provide. We collect information that is both directly useful in delivering optimal care for patients and can be analyzed to identify how to improve our practices. While we collaborate on randomized trials we emphasize more a quality improvement perspective that maintains the direct relevance of the research we do to the patients we serve.

Research Projects

We assess the true impact of our educational efforts, examine how best to integrate research findings into our clinics and practices, and critically examine how our care best results in optimal outcomes.

More about our projects