Hanmin Lee, M.D.
- Professor of Surgery
- Chief, Division of Pediatric Surgery
- Michael R. Harrison, MD, Endowed Chair in Fetal Surgery
- Surgeon in Chief, UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital, San Francisco Director, Fetal Treatment Center
- Clinical Lead, Surgical Innovations UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital, San Francisco
Contact Information
Education
- 1983-87, Johns Hopkins University, B.A., Biology
- 1987-91, New York University School of Medicine, M.D., Medicine
Residencies
- 1991-94, New York University School of Medicine, Resident, Surgery
- 1996-97, New York University School of Medicine, Senior Resident, Surgery
- 1997-98, New York University School of Medicine, Chief Resident, Surgery
Fellowships
- 1994-96, Harvard Medical School Postdoctoral, Fellow, Tissue Engineering
- 1998-00, Emory University, Fellow, Pediatric Surgery
Clinical Expertise
- Biliary Surgery
- Fetal Surgery
- Intestinal Rehabilitation
- Minimally Invasive Surgery
- Neonatal Surgery
- Pediatric Surgery
Biography
Hanmin Lee, M.D. is Professor of Surgery, and Director of the Fetal Treatment Center at UCSF. He is the second director in the 25+ year history of the Fetal Treatment Center, replacing Dr. Michael Harrison who continues to add his creative energies as Director Emeritus. Dr. Lee was an undergraduate at Johns Hopkins University who completed both medical school and general surgery residency at New York University. He did two years of postdoctoral research training under the mentorship of Dr. Jay Vacanti at Harvard Medical School, and two years of pediatric surgery fellowship at Emory University Medical Center before being recruited to a tenure-track faculty position in the Department of Surgery at UCSF in 2000.
Dr. Lee and his surgery associates confine their surgical practice exclusively to children. The group has a special interest in fetal surgery, in repair of complex defects involving the chest, lung, abdomen, bowel, and bladder, and surgical care of children from birth through adolescence. Dr. Lee and his associates, The Bay Area Pediatric Surgeons, do consultations and provide surgical care at Moffitt/Long Hospitals UCSF, California Pacific Medical Center, and Kaiser Permanente, San Francisco. They see patients regularly in their office hours and provide multidisciplinary clinics for fetal anomalies in their fetal treatment center. Additionally, they see patients with complex congenital anomalies that have been corrected by surgery in their Long-term Infant-to-adult Followup and Evaluation clinic.
Dr. Lee's clinical interests include neonatal surgery, fetal surgery, minimally invasive surgery and biliary surgery. His basic science research interests include tissue engineering, proteomic assessment of fetal-maternal diseases, and integration of emerging technologies into clinical surgery.
He has published numerous clinical and basic science articles in these fields. He is well-recognized as a leader in fetal surgery and pediatric minimally invasive surgery , having given numerous national and international talk. Additionally, he is on the editorial board of the pediatric endoscopic journal and in teaching fetal surgery and advanced pediatric laparoscopic courses. He has been a principal investigator or co-investigator on a number of fetal surgery and minimally invasive surgical trials, and is currently a co-investigator on a number of clinical trials including fetal surgery for myelomeningocele and is leading a multi-instiutional effort to investigate the role of maternal steroid administration for fetuses with large congenital cystic adenomatoid malformations.
Research & Funding
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- A Follow-up of Children Enrolled in the Management of Myelomeningocele StudySponsor: NIH/NICHDSponsor ID: U01HD068541Funding Period:Aug 2011-Jun 2016Principal Investigator
- PEDIATRIC CLINICAL RESEARCH CENTERSponsor: NIH/NCRRSponsor ID: M01RR001271Funding Period:Dec 1981-Mar 2007Co-Investigator
Clinical Trials
Data provided by UCSF Profiles, powered by CTSI
- Study ID: NCT04583644Start Date: Oct 2020Estimated Completion Date: Apr 2028Condition(s): Hernia
- Study ID: NCT00768703Start Date: Oct 2008Estimated Completion Date: Jan 0001Condition(s): Hernia
- Study ID: NCT00670956Start Date: Apr 2008Estimated Completion Date: Sep 2011Condition(s): Congenital Cystic Adenomatoid Malformation
- Study ID: NCT00060606Start Date: Feb 2003Estimated Completion Date: Jun 2017Condition(s): Meningomyelocele, Spinal Dysraphism
Publications
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- Clifton MS, Harrison MR, Ball R, Lee H. Fetoscopic transuterine release of posterior urethral valves: a new technique. Fetal Diagn Ther. 2008; 23(2):89-94. View in PubMed
- Crombleholme TM, Shera D, Lee H, Johnson M, D'Alton M, Porter F, Chyu J, Silver R, Abuhamad A, Saade G, Shields L, Kauffman D, Stone J, Albanese CT, Bahado-Singh R, Ball RH, Bilaniuk L, Coleman B, Farmer D, Feldstein V, Harrison MR, Hedrick H, Livingston J, Lorenz RP, Miller DA, Norton ME, Polzin WJ, Robinson JN, Rychik J, Sandberg PL, Seri I, Simon E, Simpson LL, Yedigarova L, Wilson RD, Young B. A prospective, randomized, multicenter trial of amnioreduction vs selective fetoscopic laser photocoagulation for the treatment of severe twin-twin transfusion syndrome. Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2007 Oct; 197(4):396.e1-9. View in PubMed
- Vu L, Tsao K, Lee H, Nobuhara K, Farmer D, Harrison M, Goldstein RB. Characteristics of congenital cystic adenomatoid malformations associated with nonimmune hydrops and outcome. J Pediatr Surg. 2007 Aug; 42(8):1351-6. View in PubMed
- Yang SH, Nobuhara KK, Keller RL, Ball RH, Goldstein RB, Feldstein VA, Callen PW, Filly RA, Farmer DL, Harrison MR, Lee H. Reliability of the lung-to-head ratio as a predictor of outcome in fetuses with isolated left congenital diaphragmatic hernia at gestation outside 24-26 weeks. Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2007 Jul; 197(1):30.e1-7. View in PubMed
- Clifton MS, Pelayo JC, Cortes RA, Grethel EJ, Wagner AJ, Lee H, Harrison MR, Farmer DL, Nobuhara KK. Surgical treatment of childhood recurrent pancreatitis. J Pediatr Surg. 2007 Jul; 42(7):1203-7. View in PubMed
In the News
- UCSF Department of Surgery - October 17, 2023UCSF Innovators win over $7 Million in FDA grant to advance medical device development for children! UCSF-Stanford Pediatric Device Consortium (PDC) receives over $7M from FDA (P50FD007967), over the next 5 years, to facilitate development of innovative medical devices specifically for children. Hanmin Lee, MD, Professor of Surgery, Div. of Pediatric Surgery and Surgeon-in-Chief at UCSF Benioff Children's Hospitals, along with a team of highly accomplished and experienced innovators from [...]
- UCSF Surgical Innovations - - June 18, 2018UCSF Surgical Innovations and San Francisco-based medical device developer TheraNova have formed a partnership that will allow for co-development of medical device technologies between them. UCSF innovators will now have a streamlined mechanism to collaborate with TheraNova engineers, which will help speed commercialization of products. The agreement formalizes a longstanding collaborative relationship between Surgical Innovations and TheraNova, providing access to the respective expertise and [...]
- UCSF Surgical Innovations - - June 06, 2018Academic hospitals have all the makings for rich medical device development. They have physicians to identify surgical needs, researchers to test theories, bioengineers to design and create devices and patients to participate in clinical trials. However, the disconnect between engineering and surgical departments makes innovation a challenge. So does surgeons' all-consuming job Number One—treating patients. Providing the Infrastructure for Surgeons to Innovate Surgical Innovations, part of [...]
- UCSF Surgical Innovations - - May 22, 2018On May 17, the Second Annual UCSF Engineering for Children's Health Symposium was held at Mission Bay Conference Center. Over one hundred clinicians, engineers, scientists, administrators, industry professionals, and government partners gathered to discuss groundbreaking research and developing technologies in pediatric medicine. The event commenced with opening remarks by Hanmin Lee, MD, Surgeon-in-Chief of the UCSF Benioff Children's Hospitals and Professor and Chief of the UCSF Division [...]
- UCSF Surgical Innovations Program - - May 31, 2017The National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB) has awarded the UCSF Department of Surgery a five-year interdisciplinary R25 research education grant for its Biodevice Innovation Training Program. The grant will fund up to two surgical residents each year with an interest in pursuing translational medicine, medical device development, and entrepreneurship during their dedicated research years. The Biodevice Innovation Training Program is led by Professors Hanmin Lee, MD, [...]
- Department of Surgery, Surgical Innovations Program - - March 02, 2017On January 12, clinicians, engineers, scientists, and administrators from UCSF, UC Berkeley. UCSF Benioff Children's Hospitals, and Children's Hospital Oakland Research Institute (CHORI) convened at the Mission Bay campus for the inaugural Engineering for Children's Health Symposium. The event, reported in UCSF News, marked the launch of a collaborative effort dedicated to developing innovative technological solutions to improve patient safety, eliminate health disparities, cure disease, and [...]
- UCSF Surgical Innovations Program - October 23, 2015Two (2) Department of Surgery research teams were awarded seed funding totaling $40,000 to accelerate their medical device innovations. The Roboimplant device, an expandable rod for orthopaedic surgery applications, took top honors, with the Sentinel Bandage, a non-invasive technology for wound monitoring, taking second place. The awards were given at the UCSF Surgical Innovations Program's inaugural Shark Tank competition on September 24th at UCSF Mission Bay. Four teams of finalists pitched [...]
- UCSF Surgical Innovations Program - September 22, 2015KQED Science for Personalized Medicine reports on a multitude of new sensor technologies that are being used to monitor medical issues, which would otherwise be time-consuming for hospital staff to manage. Hanmin Lee, M.D., Professor and Chief of the Division of Pediatric Surgery at UCSF as well as Medical Director of Surgical Innovations was interviewed for the article, offering his insights about the huge potential of the nascent field. "I firmly believe that the next 50 years are going to [...]
- UCSF Pediatric Surgery - August 19, 2012Surgeons at the UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital in San Francisco are using magnets to reshape the breastbones of children who suffer from Sunken Chest Syndrome. The technique is undergoing phase 3 clinical trials, but the doctors hope to prove that long term magnetic force is as effective and less painful than conventional surgery.
- UCSF Pediatric Surgery - August 16, 2012The Society of Clinical Trials has named UCSF's Management of Myelomeningocele Study (MOMS), a review of prenatal versus postnatal surgery for myelomengingocele (spina bifida), as its Trial of the Year. The study earned recognition as an important clinical trial that overcame difficulties and produced remarkable results.
- UCSF Pediatric Surgery - May 25, 2012UCSF Pediatric Surgery has published thier first interactive Patient Guide iBook for the iPad. This multimedia guidebook is a free educational resource for families who are faced with Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia (CDH). More guidebooks are being planned as well as epub versions for other ebook readers. The inspiration for this project is a direct result of the generous support of the CDH research and patient education grant provided by the Nayeli Faith Foundation.
- UCSF Pediatric Surgery - April 17, 2012Hanmin Lee, M.D. has been selected as one of the UCSF Medical Center's "Exceptional Physicians of 2012". Dr. Lee is Professor, Surgery, Pediatrics, Ob-Gyn and Reproductive Health Services, Chief of the Division of Pediatric Surgery, Director of the UCSF Fetal Treatment Center, and the Surgeon-in-Chief of UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital. This award is given annually to physicians who have distinguished themselves as role models and demonstrate the values of UCSF Medical Center, [...]
- UCSF Pediatric Surgery - November 02, 2010UCSF announces the formation of the Institute for Fetal and Neonatal Health symposium brings together clinicians and basic scientists involved in different aspects of development and fetal intervention.
- UCSF Fetal Treatment Center - May 09, 2007As the new Director of the Fetal Treatment Center, Dr. Hanmin Lee will continue the Center's and its co-founder Dr. Michael Harrison's pioneering spirit of multidisciplinary research and innovation to improve our understanding of fetal disease and further advance the treatment and management of infants and children. Dr. Harrison will continue as Director Emeritus of the Fetal Treatment Center.
Patient Stories
- Allison & Quinn Mendez
Living Proof that the Gift of Life Is Possible
Our story began on March 5, 2012. We were almost 26 weeks along with our second child, a son. The pregnancy had been uneventful; however, at our 20 week ultrasound our obstetrician was not able to get a clear view of our son’s heart. He told us that from what he could see, his heart appeared fine but he would like a follow up ultrasound in six weeks. We felt no cause for alarm and were pleased that our doctor was being so thorough. On the day of the follow up appointment, our doctor informed us he saw a large collection of fluid in our baby’s chest around his lungs. I also had too much[...]Story Categories: Fetal Surgery