To many people, the term heart failure conjures up an image of an out-of-the-blue emergency, a heart that has suddenly stopped beating. In reality, heart failure is a process in which the heart muscle becomes so weakened over time that it no longer pumps enough blood to meet the body's…
Dr. Kenneth J. Chang has built one of the nation's finest digestive disease centers for UCI Health with a drive and passion inspired by doctors he assisted in a poor Taiwanese fishing village nearly 30 years ago. Then a medical student, Chang had taken a year off from his studies…
When she was eight years old, Karen Sommers watched a movie about a young woman struggling with leukemia. It made her realized that she wanted to help people with cancer. Sommers has been doing exactly that for nearly 30 years, first as a registered nurse and today as a nurse…
The physicians at the UCI Health Melanoma Center specialize in the most advanced methods for determining the spread of this aggressive skin cancer beyond the initial site. One of the best predictors of the spread of melanoma is determining whether the disease involves lymph nodes, says Dr. James G. Jakowatz…
Wayne Treichel was 62 when his wife convinced him to get an endoscopy and colonoscopy. He didn’t have any symptoms or pain, and was in good health, but his wife knew preventive screening was important. As it turns out, having those exams saved Wayne’s life. His doctor diagnosed him with…
Radiation therapy has come a long way in recent years, both in success rates and patient comfort, says Dr. Nilam S. Ramsinghani, who leads UCI Health radiation oncology program. “People may not realize how far radiation therapy has evolved over the past 20 years. “When I started out, we had…
Dr. Charles Vega first walked into the UCI Health Family Health Center as a medical school graduate eager to make a difference in his first job as a physician. Twelve years later, his impact is felt both within the community of hundreds of grateful patients and their families he sees…
Two years after her 70-pound weight loss, Tafi Bandelin attributes her new life to the gastric banding procedure she underwent at UC Irvine. At 60 years old, Bandelin was 5’3” and 250 pounds. She wanted to drop the weight, but didn’t know where to turn. "I had chronic asthma, hypertension…
Each year, lung cancer kills nearly 160,000 Americans, more than breast, colorectal, pancreatic and prostate cancers combined. Its incidence rate is among the highest of all cancers, and its five-year survival rate is among the lowest. Despite a lack of research funding, progress is being made, highlighted by treatments being…
Each year, millions of Americans develop cancerous skin lesions. The vast majority of these are easily treated and highly survivable, but some are—or could become—melanomas, which can be aggressive and potentially deadly. The causes of skin cancer vary, ranging from excessive sun exposure to family genetics. People who have numerous…
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