Sleep on It

Sleep disorder illness, which has reached epidemic proportions, can affect overall health, safety, and quality of life. Snoring, insomnia, sleep apnea, sleep deprivation — all are detrimental, and all are within the purview of Dr. Frisca Yan-Go, an expert in sleep medicine who helped develop the UCLA Sleep Disorders Center. To honor her 25 years of service at UCLA, the Go family and Yan-Go’s colleagues have given $250,000 to create the UCLA Frisca Yan-Go, MD Endowed Lectureship in Sleep Medicine.

Maximizing Momentum

Since 1988, Yan-Go has grown the center from a one-doctor clinic to a comprehensive, multidisciplinary program that includes faculty from the departments of neurology, medicine, pediatrics, psychiatry, neurobiology, anesthesiology, and nursing.

The UCLA Frisca Yan-Go, MD Endowed Lectureship will bring outstanding national and international sleep specialists to UCLA annually as visiting faculty and consultants to the sleep program. Each year, a seven-person multidisciplinary committee will select the lectureship.

Giving for Greater Growth

“Frisca and I have achieved our dreams in our academic careers largely because of the generosity of others,” says Dr. Vay Liang (Bill) Go, who co-directs the UCLA Agi Hirshberg Center for Pancreatic Diseases. “I know how important gifts are to advancing research and education. My family and Frisca’s colleagues are thrilled to support this program that Frisca has been instrumental in building.”

Currently active as a recall faculty, Yan-Go inaugurated the lectureship in January 2016 and will continue her work with her colleagues and collaborators supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health.

Published March 2016