Current Members
Ashwin Kotwal, MD
Assistant Adjunct Professor, Medicine
Dr. Kotwal is an Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Division of Geriatrics at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine. He completed undergraduate training in Anthropology at Northwestern University, and his medical and biostatistics training at University of Chicago. He went on to complete his Internal Medicine residency at Harvard University’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and an integrated clinical fellowship in Geriatrics and Palliative Care at UCSF.
Dr. Kotwal devotes most of his time to research focusing on understanding and enhancing social connections of older adults to improve their quality of life and health care access. Recent work has investigated experiences of loneliness and social isolation among older adults with cognitive impairment, and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on social well-being. His research interests involve evaluation of community-based interventions to address loneliness and isolation, particularly among older adults with cognitive impairment or approaching the end of life.
Dr. Kotwal is funded by the National Institute on Aging K23 Career Development Award. He is currently a research scholar in the UCSF Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center and has received funding from the National Palliative Care Research Center, Hellman Family Fund, and Metta Foundation. He is co-Associate Director of the UCSF Division of Geriatrics NIH-funded T32 Aging Research Fellowship and has a strong interest in mentorship.
Dr. Kotwal's clinical work focuses on advancing telehealth palliative care at the San Francisco VA Medical Center (SFVAMC) where he has been Director of the Outpatient Palliative Care Telehealth Program since 2019.
Katrina Hough
Clinical Research Coordinator, Medicine
Katrina earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Neurobiology and a Bachelor of Arts in English from UC Irvine. She recruits research subjects, obtains medical and health information from participants, abstracts information from electronic clinical records, administers surveys, oversees participant payments, and analyzes data.
Danielle "Nina" Escueta, MD
Nina is an Internal Medicine resident at UCLA. She earned a Bachelors of Science degree in Human Biology with a minor in Global Heath from UC San Diego and recently completed her Medical Degree at UC San Francisco, where she helped recruit interdisciplinary volunteers, interviewed particpants, analyzed data, and synthesized results.
Nandini Singh, MPH
Research Manager & Coalition Leader
Nandini earned her Master of Public Health at the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill. Nandini serves as the team's community liaison and head of the Coalition for Social Connection (CSC). Additionally, she is responsible for the study coordination, data collection, management, and quality control of Drs. Perissinotto and Kotwal’s research.
Carla Perissinotto, MD, MHS
Adjunct Professor, Medicine
In 2017, Dr. Carla Perissinotto was appointed as the first Associate Chief for Geriatrics Clinical Programs at UCSF. Given the growth of clinical programs, the associate chief oversees and manages our both our inpatient and outpatient clinical programs which include Care at Home, Geriatrics consultation in the outpatient setting, and the new Acute Care for the Elderly (ACE) unit at Moffitt-Long Hospital, Orthopedic CO-Management programs and programs which are in development.
Carla is an Associate Professor in the Division of Geriatrics, Department of Medicine. Carla is Board Certified in Internal Medicine, Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine. Carla is dedicated to working in both community and academic settings. Her main work is in UCSF Care at Home--which provides medical care to home bound older adults, and in embedded Geriatrics consult practices. From 2008-2017, Carla served as a primary care and consulting Geriatrician at the Over60 Health Center in Berkeley.
Carla joined the faculty in August 2010 as a clinician-educator and has received multiple awards for her excellence in teaching. Carla is passionate about 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 was also a recipient of the highly-competitive HRSA Geriatric Academic Career Award 2010-2015, with which she developed curricula to teach a wide range of learners on the care of elderly patients in diverse settings. Carla has also gained national and international recognition for her research on the effects of loneliness on the health of older adults. She is frequently invited to discuss her research and discuss the clinical and policy implications of the health effects of loneliness.
Clinical:
At UCSF, she attends on the inpatient Internal Medicine Service, providers Geriatrics consultation in Women's Health Primary Care, the Positive Health 360 practice, and provides primary care to homebound older adults through UCSF Care at Home 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.
From 2008-2017, Carla spent a portion 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 directed the educational programs for UCSF learners, and focused on practice change by establishing a team-based model for community-based Geriatrics seeing adults across a continuum of care.
Carla has also had the privilege to work in clinical settings internationally, most notably, El Salvador, Kenya and Mexico. Annually, she volunteers in Chiapas, Mexico at the Hospital San Carlos (http://www.hospitalsancarlos.org/index.html) which serves the indigenous people of Chiapas. Carla has written about these experiences on GeriPal. She continues to work on improving the care of older patients in low resource settings across the globe, and has created an opportunity for trainees to volunteer in Chiapas alongside of her.
Academic Focus:
Carla published a paper in the Archives of Internal Medicine on loneliness in Older Adults in 2012 which gained worldwide recognition and has sparked more conversation in the medical community about the health effects of loneliness. 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 interested ways to improve and integrate Geriatrics curriculum into general medicine practices. She has focused on providing community Geriatrics electives to residents, creating a housecalls program for residents, and embedding Geriatrics into General Medicine and specialty clinics.
Soe Han Tha
Research Manager, Medicine
Soe Han holds a bachelor’s degree in Economics and International Studies and a minor in Chinese from Trinity College in Hartford, CT. She manages the research projects, communicates with internal and external collaborators, creates surveys, interviews participants, and analyzes data. She also runs the Coalition for Social Connection newsletter and the Social Connections and Aging website.
Dallas Panusis, MD
Dallas is a combined Internal Medicine-Anesthesiology resident at Stanford where he's exploring his interests in Critical Care and Palliative Medicine. He earned his degrees in Biology and Anthropology at UC San Diego before completing his Medical Degree at UC San Francisco. A first-generation college and medical student, Dallas has worked with this research lab to understand disparities in advance care planning among older US immigrants.