Professor, School of Medicine, University of California, United States of America

Dean Schillinger MD is a general internist, primary care physician and a UCSF Professor of Medicine. He is an international research expert in chronic disease-related public health, health communication, dissemination science and health policy. In 2006, he co-founded the UCSF Center for Vulnerable Populations, and currently directs the Health Communications Research Program housed there. He recently completed a term as Chief of the Division of General Internal Medicine at San Francisco General Hospital and previously served as Chief of the Diabetes Prevention and Control Program for California. He has been awarded numerous federal research grants to develop and evaluate health programs tailored to the literacy and language needs of patients with noncommunicable diseases. He has published over 300 peer-reviewed scientific articles and contributed to methodologic discoveries involving community-engaged research, quasi-experimental studies, natural experiments and evaluations of mass media events and social media campaigns. Of Chilean descent, he has extensive experience working with Latinx, Black, and Asian-Pacific Islander populations. He co-created a youth-led diabetes prevention social media campaign called The Bigger Picture, www.thebiggerpicture.org, which merges Arts with Public Health to catalyze social action; the campaign was recognized by the National Academy of Medicine and received WHO’s Non-Communicable Disease Lab Award. Dr. Schillinger was a recipient of APHA’s Everett M. Rogers Award for lifetime achievement in health communication science.