New Comprehensive Clinical Spine Program at UCI Medical Center

In 2019, Dr. Michael Oh, a highly-respected spine neurosurgeon from the University of Pittsburgh, joined our Department of Neurosurgery. One of his goals is to develop an infrastructure on the clinical side for a new Comprehensive Spine Center at UCI. This Center will coordinate all of the different specialties involved in the treatment of people with disorders of the spine, and who have suffered a spinal cord injury. In addition to creating an even higher level of care, the new center will provide the infrastructure for expanded human subjects research and new clinical trials to test promising therapies.

Dr. Oh brought together key stakeholders including Os Steward, Dr. Nitin Bhatia (Chair, Department of Orthopaedics) and Dr. Frank Hsu (Chair, Department of Neurosugery) to develop the formal proposal, which will be presented to the leadership of UCI Health and the School of Medicine with the goal of obtaining 5 year strategic funding for program coordination, public outreach and education.