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Faculty Profiles

Carla Perissinotto, MD
MED-GERIATRICS
Health Sciences Assistant Clinical Professor

1545 Divisadero Street
415-476-6188
Carla.Perissinotto@ucsf.edu

Overview:
Dr. Carla Perissinotto is an Assistant Clinical Professor in the Division of Geriatrics, Department of Medicine. Carla is dedicated to working in both community and academic settings; she divides her clinical activities between a community health setting at the Over60 Health Center in Berkeley and in working with Housecalls and the Geriatric Transitions, Consultation, and Comprehensive Care (GeriTraCCC) practice at UCSF.
Carla received her medical school training at Tufts University and completed both her Internal Medicine and Geriatrics training at UCSF. In addition, she holds a Masters in Health Science from Johns Hopkins University, from the Department of Population and Family Health. Carla joined the faculty in August 2010 as a clinician-educator, after being named Geriatrics Fellow of the Year at UCSF.
Carla's interests are in working with diverse communities and improving the training of internal medicine residents and all learners in the care of elderly patients. Carla also has a special interest in teaching primary care doctors how to more effectively recognize cognitive impairment in the outpatient primary care setting. Carla is also a recipient of the HRSA Geriatric Academic Career Award 2010-2015, with which she will develop curricula to teach a wide range of learners on the care of elderly patients in diverse settings. Carla also recently gained national and international recognition for her research on the effects of loneliness on the health of older adults.

Clinical:
Clinically, Carla spends half of her clinical time at the Over 60 Health Center, a Federally Qualified Health Center, serving adults over age 55 in Alameda County. At Over 60, Carla directs the educational programs for UCSF learners and she has been focusing on practice change by establishing a model for community-based Geriatrics within a team-based model. She spends the remainder of her time in Housecalls and GeriTraCCC in San Francisco. Carla is passionate about the care of vulnerable elders and truly believes in sharing this excitement with residents, and other learners via lectures, bedside teaching, small group teaching, home visits, and visits to community senior centers.

Carla has also had the privilege to work in clinical settings internationally, most notably, El Salvador, Kenya and Mexico. Most recently, she traveled to Chiapas, Mexico to volunteer in at the Hospital San Carlos (http://www.hospitalsancarlos.org/index.html) which serves the indigenous people of Chiapas. Carla wrote about these experiences on GeriPal, and hopes that this is the beginning of a long relationship, where she can work on improving the care of older patients in low resource settings across the globe. She aspires to develop an opportunity for trainees to volunteer in Chiapas in the future.

Academic Focus:
Carla has recently published a paper in the Archives of Internal Medicine on loneliness in Older Adults. Because of the wide prevalence of loneliness in older adults, there has been significant interest from multiple organizations hoping to explore ways to better identify, and intervene on loneliness. Carla is currently exploring potential future research and policy endeavors focused on loneliness.
As a Clinician-educator, Carla is dedicated to improving the Geriatrics training of Internal Medicine residents. Carla is currently investigating ways to improve and integrate Geriatrics curriculum into general medicine practices. Her current focus is on providing community Geriatrics electives to residents, creating a housecalls program for residents, and incorporating Geriatrics precepting into General Medicine clinics.

Educational Products:
1. "Geriatric Assessment Pocket Card." The Geriatric Assessment Pocket Card was created by Dr. Wayne Altman and Rossana Lau, and adapted from a chapter written by Drs. Perissinotto and Helen Kao in the "UCSF Outpatient Handbook." 2010
2. Perissinotto C, Kao H. "Geriatrics" in UCSF Guide to Outpatient Medicine. 2009
3. Perissinotto C, Pola S, VanMeter M. "Palliative Care" in Hospitalist Handbook. 2008

Recent Articles (5)

Perissinotto C, Covinsky KE. Health status in elderly persons living alone-reply. JAMA Intern Med. 2013 Feb 25; 173(4):323-4.

Perissinotto CM, Stijacic Cenzer I, Covinsky KE. Loneliness in older persons: a predictor of functional decline and death. Arch Intern Med. 2012 Jul 23; 172(14):1078-83.

Perissinotto CM, Valcour V. Preventing dementia: is there hope for progress? Am Fam Physician. 2011 May 1; 83(9):1034-5.

Lerner D, Adler DA, Chang H, Lapitsky L, Hood MY, Perissinotto C, Reed J, McLaughlin TJ, Berndt ER, Rogers WH. Unemployment, job retention, and productivity loss among employees with depression. Psychiatr Serv. 2004 Dec; 55(12):1371-8.

Adler DA, Irish J, McLaughlin TJ, Perissinotto C, Chang H, Hood M, Lapitsky L, Rogers WH, Lerner D. The work impact of dysthymia in a primary care population. Gen Hosp Psychiatry. 2004 Jul-Aug; 26(4):269-76.

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