OVERVIEW:
Eric Widera is a clinician-educator in the Division of Geriatrics. His main goal is to improve the care provided to elderly patients with severe chronic and/or terminal conditions through program development and educational innovations. Eric accomplishes this through various leadership roles, including Director of the Hospice & Palliative Care Service at the San Francisco VA Medical Center and Associate Program Director for the Geriatrics Fellowship at UCSF. He is also on the Board of Directors for the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine (AAHPM). Eric received his medical school training at UCSF and his internal medicine training at Mount Sinai Hospital. He returned to UCSF to complete a fellowship in Geriatric Medicine. He joined the faculty at UCSF in August of 2006. Since then, Eric has been the recipient of numerous grants and awards including a Geriatric Academic Career Award (GACA), the Hastings Center Cunniff-Dixon Physician Award, AAHPM Hospice and Palliative Medicine Leaders Under 40 award, and the AAHPM PDIA Palliative Medicine National Leadership Award. He is also a co-founder of GeriPal, a Geriatrics and Palliative Care blog and podcast, as well as ePrognosis, an online set of prognostic calculators for the elderly.

CLINICAL ACTIVITIES:
Dr. Widera's clinical activities are primarily based at the San Francisco VA Medical Center. He attends on and is the Director of the Hospice & Palliative Care Service at the VA. This is a busy and growing service that performs inpatient palliative care consults in the acute hospital setting and the VA Community Living Center (CLC). The Hospice and Palliative Care Service also provides primary care for a 10-bed hospice unit located within the CLC, as well as serves veterans living in the community through an outpatient Palliative Care Clinic. Eric’s other clinical responsibilities include attending on the internal medicine inpatient ward service at the San Francisco VA and supervising geriatrics fellows in caring for veterans residing in the Community Living Center.

EDUCATIONAL FOCUS:
Dr. Widera's academic focus is on improving the care we give to elderly patients with severe chronic and/or terminal conditions through program development and educational innovations. He oversees a host of interdisciplinary learners who rotate on the Hospice and Palliative Care Service at the San Francisco VA, including internal medicine residents, social work interns, and nursing students. Eric is also the Associate Program Director for the Geriatrics fellowship at UCSF. His other interests include how the use of social media sites, like GeriPal.org, can influence medical education and clinical practice.