David E. Hayes-Bautista

David E. Hayes-Bautista, Ph.D. is Distinguished Professor of Medicine and Director of the Center for the Study of Latino Health and Culture at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. He graduated from U.C. Berkeley and completed his doctoral work in Basic Sciences at the University of California Medical Center, San Francisco. He served on the faculty at the School of Public Health at U.C. Berkeley until 1987, when he took his current position at UCLA.

His research on the Latino Epidemiological Paradox led him to find links between culture, behavior, history and health. Some of his published books include The Burden of Support: Young Latinos in an Aging Society (Stanford University Press, 1988,) El Cinco de Mayo: An American Tradition (University of California Press, 2012,) La Nueva California: Latinos from Pioneers to Post-Millennials (University of California Press, 2017) and The Latino Big Bang in California: The Diary of Justo Veytia, a Mexican Forty-Niner (University of New Mexico Press, 2023).

In 2012, he received the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) Herbert W. Nickens Award for his lifelong concerns about the educational, societal, and health care needs of underrepresented groups, and received in 2016 the Ohtli Award from the Mexican Government for his work in transnational health. The National Hispanic Bar Association selected him for the Academic Leadership Award in 2024. Dr. Hayes-Bautista writes columns for the Los Angeles Times and La Opinion, and is often asked to provide opinions on radio and television in both Spanish and English.