Educational Mission
The Department of Preventive Medicine’s educational mission is to train medical, graduate and undergraduate students regarding the most current knowledge of disease etiology and prevention and the most up-to-date technologies and methodologies for addressing disease etiology and prevention.
Research mission
The Department of Preventive Medicine’s research mission is to carry out far reaching and cutting edge research that has the overall purpose of providing the evidence needed to advance population health.
1970s
The Los Angeles Cancer Surveillance Program, the first population-based cancer registry in LA, was envisioned by cancer epidemiologist Brian Henderson in 1969. It commenced in 1972 with researchers Thomas Mack, Malcolm Pike, Susan Preston-Martin and John Hisserich. The program continues to collect and analyze information on all new cancer diagnoses to this day, and has become one of the world’s most productive cancer registries.
The Department of Community & Family Medicine was founded in 1978, with Brian Henderson appointed the inaugural chair by then-Dean Allen W. Mathies, Jr. Henderson would later become dean of the USC medical school 2004 to 2007 and Kenneth T Norris Jr Chair in Cancer Prevention.
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1980s
John M. Peters founded the Department of Community & Family Medicine Division of Environmental Health and the Children’s Health Study in 1980.Learn more about the study
In 1983 the Department of Community & Family Medicine split into the Department of Family Medicine and Department of Preventive Medicine.
Malcolm Pike, recruited by Brian Henderson, took the helm of the Department of Preventive Medicine in 1989.
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1990s
In 1993, the population-based Multiethnic Cohort Study began, led by Brian Henderson. The long-term study examines the link between lifestyle and cancer in ethnic groups and recruits thousands of Los Angeles area residents.
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Learn more about the history of the Keck School of Medicine of USC »