By Sunita Mutha, MD, FACP, Director of Healthforce Center

If 2020 was the year of a collective reckoning on racial injustice across the nation, then 2021 was the year of laser-like focus on how to redouble our efforts to advance equity and become more anti-racist. As Healthforce Center at UCSF will celebrate our 30th anniversary in 2022, we are taking extra time to review where we've been and where we are going.

By Renae Waneka, Senior Manager, People & Programs at Healthforce Center

With September comes a return to classes at UC San Francisco, and a new cycle of learning begins. Healthforce Center uses a dashboard of metrics to support and evaluate its internal learning and development. This year, I expected our staff engagement scores to be negatively affected by the difficulties of life during a pandemic. But the scores were so high I was astonished. Learning can come with happy surprises!

“Structural racism.” “Institutional racism.” “Societal racism.” These are phrases that we commonly hear today that signal acknowledgement of the breadth and depth with which white supremacy maintains power in our lives.

These terms also enable some of us, as individuals, to maintain distance between ourselves and “it.” By talking about racism as something larger, all encompassing, and immutable, people can at the same time excuse ourselves from confronting the many ways we uphold and reinforce racism, according to Dr. Monica Soni, Senior Medical Director at New Century Health.

Thirty mid-level clinicians and administrative staff who work in community health centers and other safety-net organizations in Los Angeles have been selected to participate in Cedars-Sinai’s Community Clinic Initiative: Managing to Leading (M2L) program. Funded by Cedars-Sinai and administered by Healthforce Center at UCSF, this program develops promising staff with the knowledge, skills, and confidence to effectively lead change and improve health care delivery.

By Sunita Mutha, MD, FACP, Director of Healthforce Center

As we look forward from this recent presidential election, there is a lot to celebrate given the huge success of “get out the vote” efforts. However we might feel about the results of the state and presidential elections, there are important reflections about where we are at this moment in time and how we prepare for what’s ahead of us still. 

By Sunita Mutha, MD, FACP

By Sunita Mutha, MD, FACP

By Sunita Mutha, MD, FACP, Director of Healthforce Center

L.A. Care Health Plan and Healthforce Center at UCSF are partnering together to host a four-part seminar series focused on providing topical content to clinic leaders in the Los Angeles county safety net. This seminar series is tailored for alumni from leadership programs including L.A. Care’s Physician Leadership Program and Healthforce Center-led Clinic Leadership Institute and Cedars-Sinai Managing to Leading Program.