Heather Nye, MD, PhD

Professor

Dr. Heather E. Nye is Chief of Medicine at the San Francisco VA Health Care System and Professor and Vice Chair, and the Marvin H. Sleisenger Endowed Chair in the UCSF Department of Medicine. She received her MD PhD from Yale School of Medicine & the Department of Pharmacology then completed a combined residency program in medicine and pediatrics at the Harvard Combined Med-Peds Program. She has practiced as a clinician educator within UCSF and SFVAHCS hospital medicine groups since 2003.

Dr. Nye’s clinical role caring for hospitalized patients on orthopedics, neurosurgery, and podiatry led to the development of several quality initiatives, educational programs, and collaboration with specialty services to address gaps in care for older adults undergoing surgery. She built the interdisciplinary Veterans Integrated Perioperative (VIP) Clinic in 2017 for medically complex and frail older adults with an aim of streamlined, comprehensive, and evidence-based care in the perioperative period.

Through 2025 Dr. Nye directed the SFVAHCS Consult/Co-Management Service & VIP clinic. She is recognized as a national expert in hospital and perioperative medicine and is invited to give several talks annually. She is an active member of the Society of Hospital Medicine (SHM) and the Society of Perioperative Assessment & Quality Improvement (SPAQI) and was elected to their respective boards in 2025. She served as the 2022 Course Director for the SHM Annual Conference and delivered the 2023 SHM Plenary Updates in Hospital Medicine. She is deeply passionate about care of Veterans and spends considerable time in Medical Center initiatives around operations, patient flow, quality, physician wellness, and strategic growth.