Bio
Dr. Laleh Gharahbaghian was born in Iran and came to the United States at the young age of 3, growing up in San Diego where she became an avid beachgoer and body surfer. She started volunteering at various community organizations, including the AIDS Foundation and San Diego's Youth and Community Services, at the age of 16 due to her commitment for giving back to the community in areas where not many would tread. This is why she created the Determined Advocates for Social Health at UCSD while an undergraduate, which began her interest in the field of medicine. Working in the 911 dispatch center and on a paramedic unit in the years before entering medical school, her interest in emergency medicine flourished.
She is an academic emergency physician who completed her fellowship in Emergency Ultrasound in 2007 at Stanford and remained on the Stanford faculty serving as Director of Emergency Ultrasound fellowship and program, now serving as Medical Director for Emergency Medicine. Her interests include ultrasound in medical education, operations, human factors engineering, quality improvement, resident education, and simulation-based ultrasound training, including procedural skills training and case-based learning for ultrasound interpretation and integration. Her research involves the study of professionalism on patient/provider care, high quality care advocacy, various point-of-care ultrasound applications in the management of critical patients, in the screening of trauma patients, and in its education through simulation models. She is a leader in the national bedside ultrasound educational impact, has lead several very successful educational innovations in emergency ultrasound, including her internationally-known blog, SonoSpot.com, and being the first to create an online ultrasound-focused educational opportunity through gamification with SonoDocGame.com. Due to her belief that adding ultrasound can enhance learning of the human body and disease while quickening diagnoses and life-saving interventions, she has co-directed UltraFest, a free national medical student ultrasound symposium at Stanford, and travels internationally to provide educational sessions on ultrasound integration into emergency practice at various developed and underdeveloped countries and rural village clinics. She continues to instruct at several successful national CME ultrasound workshops, which has included the national scientific assembly for the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP) and Stanford's Point-of-Care Ultrasound Workshop. He most recent academic focus involves case review workflows for optimal patient safety and the impact of professional communication on patient care.
She was the Co-Chair of ACEP's Ultrasound Section Newsletter that publishes interesting cases and topics in bedside ultrasound quarterly and is a Faculty Mentor in the Chief Resident and Fellowship Incubator for the internationally known Academic Life in Emergency Medicine group. These educational efforts and her supervisory role in the emergency department have resulted in many faculty teaching awards. By being the Co-Chair of the Case Review Committee (formerly Professional Performance and Evaluation Committee) and continuing to work in the emergency department to care for her patients, she continues to be an advocate for social health, providing the highest quality of care, and ensuring that all patients and their family members feel assured that they are in good hands.
