Patricia Lester, MD

Dr. Patricia Lester has sustained a career-long focus on developing and disseminating preventive interventions, practices, and policies that support child and family resilience in the context of trauma and adversity. Her research and leadership have focused on the study of translational and implementation processes needed to bring evidence-based prevention to scale within systems of care and community settings. Dr. Lester is the director of the DMH + UCLA Public Partnership for Wellbeing. She is the Jane and Marc Nathanson Family Professor of Psychiatry and directs the UCLA Division of Population Behavioral Health within the Department of Psychiatry. She also serves as the Director of the Nathanson Family Resilience Center, Co-Director of the Center for Child Anxiety Resilience Education and Support (CARES), and the leadership team for the UCLA Pritzker Center for Strengthening Children and Families.