Not everyone comes to a life-changing epiphany by witnessing her mother play Candy Crush and her son log hours on Minecraft. Of course, not everyone is Diana Ramos.
You might recognize Dr. Ramos through her official role: California’s surgeon general. Appointed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2022, she is California’s leading spokesperson on the state’s most pressing public health issues, and is responsible for driving solutions to address those challenges. In Anteater terms, however, she is a 2020 graduate of the UC Irvine Paul Merage School of Business executive MBA program.
Before becoming California’s top doctor, Ramos held the position of assistant deputy director of chronic disease prevention for the California Department of Public Health and was a practicing Southern California Kaiser Permanente OB-GYN. She applied to UC Irvine’s MBA program while working full time in public health and delivering babies part time because she was chasing a dream. In her spare time (whenever that was), Ramos was conceiving her next venture: a company she launched in 2018 – inspired by her family’s fascination with video games and a pivotal experience she’d had years earlier working at the Los Angeles County Department of Health.
In 2010, Ramos had developed an innovative program for L.A. County involving text messaging new mothers to remind them of healthy life choices, like drinking more water, walking and breastfeeding.
“This was back when no government agency was really texting people, so it was exciting,” she recalls. In the pilot program, 97% of the moms who received the text messages lost their extra pregnancy weight in three months compared to the two years it took the average new mother to lose pregnancy and postpartum weight gain. The experience opened her eyes wide to the power of technology to improve health.
“I came to the MBA program because I wanted to do more with tech and health – I wanted to know how to create and run a startup,” explains Ramos, who lives with her family in Orange County. The school appealed to her because it offers an entrepreneurship track with a healthcare management emphasis. Once accepted, she received some welcome news. UC Irvine awarded Ramos a scholarship acknowledging her public health leadership. “I was so surprised,” she says. “All I could think is, ‘I’m going to be a part of a school that really believes in me.’”
Except for having to learn Excel, Ramos describes the executive MBA program – which meets for one weekend every three weeks for 21 months and requires students to complete plenty of out-of-class projects – as “a wonderful experience.”
“I got to meet all kinds of people who do startups,” she says. “I was able to listen to others’ experiences and get peer-to-peer support. It was fantastic, and the professors were amazing.” Ramos was even fortunate enough to travel to China with her MBA cohort in September 2019, just months before the pandemic would make that impossible for the foreseeable future.
During her time at UC Irvine, she developed Teen MindGames, a video game designed for teens that screens for signs of depression. That app won the UCI Entrepreneur Class Shark Tank competition. Ramos also developed CovidBlast, an app that helped users determine how to safely navigate the pandemic. And then she got the call: “I was asked if I might be interested in the California surgeon general position.” Ramos’ unwavering commitment to public health meant she couldn’t turn down the opportunity.
After a successful vetting process, including a confirmation hearing that she describes as even more taxing than taking the oral exam to become a board-certified OB-GYN, Ramos was appointed the second-ever California surgeon general. (There are only five states in the U.S. that have surgeon generals.) She’s the first Latina to hold the position.
Ramos describes her life as a Cinderella story: She’s a first-generation college graduate who grew up in South Central Los Angeles with a single mom who often worked multiple jobs just to make ends meet. She earned a medical degree from USC’s Keck School of Medicine in 1994 and a master’s in public health from UCLA in 2004.
Ramos doesn’t take her responsibility lightly: “It’s an incredible honor to impact the lives of so many people.” And being bilingual in English and Spanish offers her a way to connect with individuals who don’t feel represented. “I want everyone to see that if I can do it, anyone can do it,” Ramos says. Hands down, the most rewarding experience of being California’s surgeon general has been when people reach out to say she’s inspired them. Says Ramos: “They come to me – sometimes crying – saying, ‘I can’t believe that there’s a Latina woman doing this.’”
A member of UC Irvine’s Dean Leadership Circle, Ramos delivered the Merage School of Business commencement address in 2021 and has recently joined the UCI-OC Alliance, a group that seeks to advance UC Irvine as a Latino-thriving university through engaging and supporting Latino students, faculty and staff.
“I want everyone to see that if I can do it, anyone can do it.”
Her current priorities as California’s surgeon general are maternal health, mental health and adverse childhood experiences. Right now, she’s laser-focused on Strong Start & Beyond, a statewide effort to reduce maternal morbidity and mortality.
“We know that Black moms are dying more than all other races and ethnicities,” Ramos says. “Most of these deaths are preventable.” Toward the end of the year, Ramos’ office – in collaboration with major health tech companies – will roll out an evidence-based, seven-question quiz, called PRIMA, which will help empower Californians to better understand their maternal health risks.
She predicts the quiz will become ubiquitous: “If someone is using an app to see when they’re ovulating, it will be there. If someone is using a health and well-being app, it’ll be there.” Ramos has prioritized public-private partnerships because she understands that public health advocates “can’t expect people to come to us; we have to go to where people already are.”
She says that what she learned in business school has been a major asset: “I can communicate and connect with people in the business world. We’ve studied the same Harvard Business School cases. We speak the same business language. Sometimes I can even give them advice,” she says jokingly.
While Ramos has put her company on the back burner as she focuses on her job as California’s surgeon general, she acknowledges that there’s still an entrepreneurial fire burning. What might the far-out future hold?
“I think I’d like to enter an era of being completely on the creation side,” Ramos muses. “Maybe something like an innovations officer.”
But for now, she’s focusing on public health. In fact, she’s excited about UC Irvine’s recent launch of the Joe C. Wen School of Population & Public Health.
“The school’s timely debut is critical in developing the public health workforce as well as being a partner in Orange County, California and beyond,” Ramos says. “My office looks forward to cross-collaboration.”
She’s also counting her blessings. “I never would’ve been able to do what I have without my mom and my husband pitching in with my son – I’m grateful to them,” Ramos says.
And she’s thankful for her experience at UC Irvine: “The school is really committed to the community and to helping people access higher education. UCI has been instrumental in elevating so many people – including me.”
