Director of Emergency Medicine Critical Care

Harbor-UCLA Medical Center (Harbor-UCLA) is a Level 1 Trauma Center and Level 2 Pediatric Trauma Center in Torrance, California. Harbor-UCLA serves as a crucial Department of Health Services (DHS) safety net hospital for the South Bay region of Los Angeles County, and it boasts a decades-long track record of exceptional care delivery, education, and innovation. The Los Angeles County DHS is the nation’s second largest metropolitan health system. The DHS mission is to “advance the health of our patients and our communities by providing extraordinary care,” and its vision is to be, “recognized nationally as a model integrated health system.” The Department of Emergency Medicine (DEM) at Harbor-UCLA has more than 90,000 patient visits annually from a largely underserved population. The DEM has a storied history as one of the nation’s first Emergency Medicine residencies, the site of the first formal paramedic training program, and has a track record of outstanding training and highly influential faculty contributions in clinical care, education, leadership, research, and innovation. 

Harbor-UCLA is a key teaching hospital for the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. UCLA consistently ranks as one of the nation’s top medical schools and health systems, and its mission is to “deliver leading-edge patient care, research, education, and community engagement.”  

Primary Duties:

• Administrative and Educational Duties –The Director of Emergency Medicine Critical Care (DEMCC) will be a leader within the Department of Emergency Medicine (DEM). At the direction of the DEM Chair and Vice Chair of Clinical Operations, the DEMCC will oversee all key critical care functions within the DEM and serve as the DEM’s primary liaison for critical care at Harbor-UCLA. The DEMCC will be charged with optimizing ED-based initial and ongoing care for critically ill and injured patients. This will include developing and implementing clinical protocols, educating residents, nurses, and faculty, overseeing critical care quality improvement efforts, and working with critical care colleagues throughout Harbor-UCLA to ensure practice optimization, timely and efficient handoffs, and best patient outcomes. In addition, the DEMCC will be expected to be an active participant and subject matter expert in upcoming resuscitation initiatives such as eCPR implementation, prehospital blood transfusion, and other novel care practices at Harbor-UCLA.As a full-time faculty member at a premier academic institution with emergency medicine resident and fellow training and student educational programs, the DEMCC will be expected to: attend EM Faculty meetings, present progress to DEM executive leadership, attend ED Community Council meetings, and a variety of other operational related meetings, interview residency applicants, contribute regularly to the residency didactic curriculum, and attend DEM conferences. Additional meetings and duties may be assigned by the Chair or Vice Chair of Clinical Operations. Faculty are expected to dedicate sufficient effort to administrative and education duties to achieve excellent results. 

•  Clinical Duties – The DEMCC will provide clinical coverage in the Adult and Pediatric Emergency Departments and will be assigned shifts providing direct patient care, including nights, weekends, and holidays, according to DEM practices. The shift load may vary, at the discretion of the Chair, based on departmental needs. The DEMCC will also provide attending coverage in one or more of Harbor-UCLA’s ICUs. During these clinical shifts and ICU coverage, the faculty member will be responsible for the education and supervision of various learners, including medical students, nurse practitioners, resident physicians, fellows, as well as the provision of direct patient care. The faculty member will be expected to evaluate both learners and peers on a regular basis.

• Scholarly and Academic Activities –The DEMCC will be expected to produce academic and creative work. The creative work may span a variety of areas including original research, quality improvement projects, health services research, educational research, or policy creation. The incumbent will work with the Vice Chair of Clinical Operations and research faculty to plan and guide scholarly activities. These efforts should result in publications that advance knowledge and demonstrate the impact of the faculty member’s work. The DEMCC must merit appointment at the academic rank of non-tenured Health Sciences Clinical Assistant Professor or higher in the Department of Emergency Medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.  

Required Qualifications:

Faculty candidates must be board certified in Emergency Medicine by either the American Board of Emergency Medicine (ABEM) or the American Osteopathic Board of Emergency Medicine. The DEMCC must have ABEM subspecialty certification in one of the critical care fields. The ideal DEMCC candidate should possess a rich portfolio of skills and experiences related to critical care operations in a variety of settings, academic medicine scholarship, healthcare leadership, and program building. The candidate should have a keen interest in improving ED and healthcare system critical care, as well as in academic medicine and program implementation. The candidate should have strong problem-solving capabilities and a demonstrated track record of teamwork and relationship building. 

The County of Los Angeles is an active equal opportunity employer. 

Applicants should send a letter of interest and CV to:  

Jennifer Roh, MD, MBA 

Chair, DEMCC Search Committee 

Adult Emergency Department Medical Director 

Harbor-UCLA Medical Center 

Health Sciences Associate Professor 

David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA 

jroh@dhs.lacounty.gov