Dr. Enrico Castillo, assistant professor of psychiatry at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, has been named as an emerging leader in health and medicine scholar by the National Academy of Medicine.
The Emerging Leaders in Health and Medicine program recognizes early- to mid-career leaders, researchers and healthcare providers and provides unique opportunities to collaborate with the National Academy of Medicine and its members over a three-year period. Castillo is one of ten members of the program’s 2025 class.
“This year has foregrounded to me the importance of science that speaks to the problems of our time,” Castillo said. “I feel deeply honored to be a part of the Emerging Leaders in Health and Medicine program, to represent UCLA and to share my perspectives on the intersections among policy, practice, social medicine and health services research. I am grateful to UCLA and all of my mentors and colleagues for their support.”
“With their cross-cutting experiences, these exceptional leaders will be prepared help catalyze transformative change, address our most urgent health challenges, and advance health and well-being for individuals and communities,” National Academy of Medicine President Victor J. Dzau said of Castillo and the 2025 class.
Castillo is an associate professor of clinical psychiatry at the Center for Social Medicine and Humanities in the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences and member of the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA. His research combines social medicine and health services with the aim of improving the capacity of public systems to address health and social needs for people with serious mental illness, specifically for incarcerated and homeless individuals. He is a second-generation Filipino American.
He is currently leading a NIMH-funded project on the jail-to-homelessness pipeline experienced by individuals with serious mental illness. He is a member of the California State Council on Criminal Justice and Behavioral Health and was a member of the New Voices Initiative of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.