Guest Speaker Bio - Dr. Alex Ortega

Dr. Alex Ortega an epidemiologist and health services researcher, is a Professor of Public Health and Psychiatry & Bio-behavioral Sciences at UCLA. Professor Ortega is the Principal Investigator of the UCLA Center for Population Health and Health Disparities, a multi-project, NHLBI-funded P50 center that aims to understand and intervene on cardiovascular disease disparities among Latinos in East Los Angeles, California. He is also the Associate Director of the Chicano Studies Research Center in the Institute of American Cultures.

Ortega is an internationally recognized expert on the application of epidemiological methods in health services research, and his work focuses on the physical and mental health and medical needs of Latino children and their families both in the United States and in the U.S. Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. He has also published health research on the homeless, military veterans, and undocumented immigrants.

Before joining the UCLA faculty in 2004, Ortega was Assistant Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health at Yale University and an Associate Professor of Public Health at The Ohio State University. He has also been a Senior Research Associate at the W.M. Krogman Center for Research in Child Growth and Development at the University of Pennsylvania and a Senior Scholar in Residence in the Center for Primary Care Research at the Agency for Health Care Research & Quality.

Professor Ortega holds a B.A. in economics from the University of New Mexico, an M.P.H. in epidemiology and biostatistics from Boston University, and a Ph.D. in epidemiologic science from the University of Michigan. He is a recipient of the Distinguished Nationally Known Public Health Professional Award by the Latino Caucus of the American Public Health Association and the Distinguished Alumni Award from Boston University School of Public Health.