Meet Dr. Maxwell Jen

Dr. Maxwell Jen is an emergency physician at UC Irvine Medical Center and holds the role of assistant clinical professor and associate medical director. Dr. Jen obtained his Bachelor of Science in molecular biology at Berkeley, his Doctor of Medicine at UCSF, completed his residency in Emergency Medicine and fellowship in Clinical Informatics at University of California, Irvine. Currently, he is earning his Master of Business Administration at UCLA Anderson School of Management.

Clinical informatics has become a major force in our healthcare system with the growth of electronic health record systems, outcomes-based medicine and data-driven population health. Improving our interactions with technology enables the collection, analysis and application of large-scale data to improve the healthcare system by optimizing care-delivery efficiencies, medical resource utilization, and ultimately patient outcomes. In essence, informatics generates the innovations that will benefit our patients, hospitals, and community.

As a clinical informaticist, Dr. Jen’s research focuses on the interplay between the healthcare systems and the healthcare provider. Using data, he works to improve the quality, efficacy, and delivery of care in the emergency department, while continuing the institutions mission to educate and train medical students and resident physicians. Dr. Jen’s work has also been used internally to effect changes in policy and operations within the Department of Emergency Medicine at UC Irvine.

Dr. Jen’s passion for academia stems from a drive for continual personal development, and also from a desire to train the next generation of informatics-enabled physicians. He believes that submersion in an academic environment has challenged him to grow as a physician, leader, and educator and keeps him accountable and up-to-date with the latest developments and practices in medicine. Dr. Jen also believes that an effective educator is defined by the ability to effectively communicate with the student, patient, or given audience. Just as a technology’s effectiveness is defined by how well the user can interact with it, so goes an educator’s ability.

Dr. Jen has been an indispensable asset to medical education at UC Irvine, and his work in clinical informatics has provided the emergency department with invaluable insights that have been used to better serve the population and community of Orange County and beyond.