The UCLA Clinical and Translational Science Institute (UCLA CTSI) is a research partnership of the University of California Los Angeles, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science and Harbor-UCLA Medical Center/Lundquist Institute for Biomedical Innovation. The CTSI provides the research infrastructure to translate discoveries to improve health in Los Angeles County, a diverse metropolis of 10 million people. Our institutions and affiliates encompass a range of health care delivery systems and research environments that include academic medical centers, safety-net hospitals and community clinics.
Since our inception in 2011, our hub infrastructure has supported more than 2,094 faculty investigators and trainees. By supporting research across the full translational spectrum – from the lab bench to the clinic and the health care system and finally, to the community -- we are enabling investigators to address the leading causes of premature death in our community, and other critical health problems. In collaboration with the Los Angeles County Health Agency, we are improving care in the safety net. In a transformational partnership with community pharmacists and 52 Los Angeles barbershops, we launched a successful model for detecting and treating undiagnosed high-blood pressure in African American men.
The CTSI is one of more than 50 institutes nationwide supported by a Clinical and Translational Science Award from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences.
The mission of the UCLA CTSI is to produce and implement innovations that impact the greatest health needs of Los Angeles and the nation. Our vision is to catalyze research that translates discoveries into tangible improvements in health care, disease prevention, and health in our community.
The UCLA CTSI is organized into 12 programs through which we will achieve the following five aims.
Aim 1. Enhance education and training to prepare and expand the translational workforce.
To meet the dynamic needs of faculty, trainees, community partners and research staff for education and training, we are designing programs in good clinical practice, biomedical informatics, entrepreneurship, and implementation science. Equity, Diversity and Inclusion is a foundational principle of our programs.
Aim 2. Engage stakeholder communities in multidisciplinary team science and disseminate successful models of collaboration.
To improve community health, we are creating community-based partnerships to codesign, develop and rapidly implement cross-sectoral models as we continue our partnership with Los Angeles County Health Agency. We will provide pilot funding to facilitate the formation of multidisciplinary teams that will address critical community needs.
Aim 3. Integrate special populations, including those experiencing health disparities, into all phases of translational research.
To assure that children, older adults, and people experiencing health disparities will benefit from biomedical advances, we are developing platforms to integrate special populations into research.
Aim 4. Improve methods and processes to accelerate efficient, high-quality, multisite research.
To support investigators with limited experience in clinical research, we are providing training and education, consultations, and incentives to facilitate clinical and population research within our health systems, community and across the CTSA network.
Aim 5. Provide informatics solutions to advance high-impact translational science.
To leverage the power of informatics to impact translational biomedicine within our hub and across the CTSA network, we are incorporating data from mobile health (mHealth), molecular, and other emerging data sources into our data warehouse. We will harness the multidisciplinary expertise within the CTSI to translate data science and artificial intelligence into practice.