My journey

Growing up in California’s Central Valley, I was the youngest of six children, born to hard-working immigrant parents from Northern Mexico. Originally, I had planned on following in my older brother’s footsteps towards a career in the legal profession. That all changed when my mother got sick. 

The physicians at Stanford hospital’s ICU kept telling me “it's gonna be OK,” but all I could think was ‘this doesn’t look OK at all’. Then I saw a short, young, Mayan-looking woman walking down the hallway who kind of looked like me. Instead of pushing a broom, she was wearing a white lab coat and carrying a clipboard.  She pulled me aside and told me in Spanish, “I’ll make sure your mother is well-cared for and gets better.” I knew right then and there that I wanted to be a doctor. Thankfully, my mother got better and I’ve been managing my parent’s medical care ever since, helping to guide them through the confusing maze that is our modern healthcare system.

Early Education

Gifted in math and science, combined with a strong work ethic, I graduated early from high school at age sixteen and was accepted to UC Berkeley as a freshman. My brother told me, “college isn’t a place where you’re going to go and experiment, or find yourself. Your goal is to graduate—treat it like a job!” I will never forget that.

After graduation, I moved to Los Angeles and obtained my medical degree from the University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine. Medical school was a never-ending job and one of the hardest challenges of my life. Putting in the endless hours of studying, developing the necessary skills to interview patients and take their physical health history, I started to understand the responsibility practicing physician’s have in caring for patients' lives.  The trust that patients and their families put in physicians is an enormous responsibility that I never take lightly. 

Advanced Education

In 1992 I was fortunate to attend Contra Costa County’s Family Medicine Residency Program in Martinez, California. Known simply as The Martinez Program, it was a family medicine residency affiliated with Contra Costa County. There I had the privilege of training with some of the best faculty in the country and It had a profound impact on me—learning how to understand the impact that family physicians can have in large rural communities. 

Next, I attended the Obstetrics and Gynecology (OB/GYN) fellowship program in Austin, Texas which was designed for family doctors who wanted to further obtain critical surgery skills in OB/GYN. Not only did I hone in on my clinical skills, but this is where I truly learned to be a leader. When you’re managing the mother-baby unit, you’re responsible for not one, but two lives and it's a huge responsibility. That transitional phase—switching from a physician to a leader—would be the foundation for the rest of my career. The level of communication required to provide an excellent patient experience is unprecedented. The responsibility bestowed upon a physician leader was extraordinary and something that I take pride in to this day.

Professional Experience

After finishing my residency, I joined the family practice faculty at the University of Texas Health Science Center, in San Antonio. As an associate professor, I ran the OB/GYN program for family practice residents who would be serving rural communities of Texas that did not have OB/GYN’s available to them. Learning to teach and transfer my knowledge by becoming a mentor and being a part of the students educational journey was extremely rewarding.  

Moving back to California, I continued my leadership journey, becoming the Chief Medical Officer and Vice President of Peninsula Medical Clinic, an affiliation of Sutter Health. There I helped to build a 100 million dollar company.

• Data science
• IT / EHR 
• Healthtech startups

Using my clinical experience combined with my business acumen and leadership skills has given me a broader understanding of how best to map the ultimate patient journey and create value using technology towards the best possible patient outcomes.Click here to download my full CV. 

I’m an avid tennis player who loves traveling, good food and spending time walking in the great outdoor