David Brenner, M.D.

An executive officer from a UC with a medical school
Appointed by UCSD Chancellor

David Brenner, M.D., a distinguished physician-scientist who began his academic career at UC San Diego, is Vice Chancellor for Health Sciences and Dean of the School of Medicine at UC San Diego. Brenner leads the UC San Diego School of Medicine, Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, UCSD Medical Center and UCSD Medical Group. He has oversight of over 900 health sciences faculty physicians, pharmacists and scientists; 7,500 staff; more than 600 medical and pharmacy students; and a health system that cares for approximately 125,000 patients
annually.

Brenner is a leader in the field of gastroenterological research, specializing in diseases of the liver. He is widely known and respected as a translational scientist whose work bridges the laboratory and the clinical setting. He has focused on understanding the molecular pathogenesis of fibrotic liver disease and the genetic basis of liver disorders as the foundation for improving prevention and treatment of diseases of this organ. He is also recognized as an outstanding clinician and teacher.

For five years he was Editor-in-Chief of Gastroenterology, the premier journal in the field. After earning his M.D. from the Yale University School of Medicine and completing his residency at Yale-New Haven Medical Center, Brenner was a research associate in the Genetics and Biochemistry Branch of the National Institute of Arthritis, Diabetes, Digestive and Kidney Diseases of the National Institutes of Health. He first came to UC San Diego in 1985 on a fellowship in gastroenterology, later joining the faculty of UC San Diego School of Medicine, and serving as a physician at the Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System. He became a Pew Scholar in the Biomedical Sciences and a Clinical Investigator in the VA system. He left UC San Diego in 1992 to become Professor and Chief of the Division of Digestive Diseases and Nutrition at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he continued to earn accolades for his patient care and research contributions. Brenner became the Samuel Bard Professor and Chair of the Department of
Medicine at Columbia University Medical Center, College of Physicians and Surgeons, and Physician-in-Chief of New York Presbyterian Hospital/ Columbia in 2003.

Brenner’s professional associations include the American Society for Clinical Investigation, the Association of American Physicians, for which he is the secretary, the American College of Physicians, and the American Gastroenterological Association, for which he is chair of the Research Policy Committee, and the American Clinical and Climatological Association. He is also on the board of directors of two philanthropic foundations, the AlphaOne Foundation and the
Alcoholic Beverage Medical Research Foundation.