Alka Kanaya, MD, is the director of CTSI's Consultation Services (CS) program and a professor at the UCSF School of Medicine.
How long have you worked at UCSF?
I have been at UCSF since my medical school training which began in 1990, and officially joined the faculty in the Department of Medicine in 2001 after completing my General Internal Medicine fellowship.
What do you do at UCSF and how is it connected to the UCSF mission?
I participate in most aspects of the UCSF mission (caring, healing, teaching and discovering). I am a primary care physician in the General Medicine clinic based at Mt. Zion and care for a panel of approximately 230 patients. I teach patient care to medical students and residents in the clinical setting and lead works in progress and grant writing seminars for research fellows and junior faculty. I conduct patient-oriented clinical research focused on type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease prevention. I direct the Consultation Services program through CTSI and want to expand our services to be most useful for our research community.
What are the most challenging and rewarding parts of your job?
The most rewarding part of my work is in interacting with junior investigators and helping them succeed with completion of a project or a career goal. The most challenging aspect of my job is in balancing all of my competing responsibilities.
What do you look forward to the most about your work with CTSI / Consultation Services (CS)?
I look forward to reaching more researchers within UCSF as well as in the UC BRAID consortium with a variety of different services we offer and being flexible to new ideas and needs which will help researchers at every level succeed.
If you chose another career path outside UCSF what would it be?
Not sure, but something to do with teaching and higher education.
What's something that your colleagues or members of the UCSF community might be surprised to know about you?
I was born in Mumbai, India and moved to the U.S. with my family when I was 6 years old.
What are your favorite things to do with your free time?
I practice yoga several days per week, spend a lot of my free time gardening, and love to experiment with new recipes with our two teen-aged daughters.
CTSI Spotlight is part of an ongoing series that offers an opportunity for faculty and staff to learn more about the wide range of people who make CTSI's work possible. See all featured faculty and staff.