A photo of Uma Kotagal.

Uma R. Kotagal, MBBS, MSc


  • Senior Fellow, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center
  • Emeritus, UC Department of Pediatrics

About

Biography

Uma Kotagal is a senior fellow at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center.

Dr. Kotagal was director of the neonatal intensive care units at the University Hospital and at Cincinnati Children’s for several years. While practicing, Dr. Kotagal recognized that care and outcomes improvement were a system property. She completed additional training, receiving her Master of Science in clinical epidemiology and clinical effectiveness from the Harvard School of Public Health, and refocused her clinical efforts on quality transformation at a systems level. She was also a visiting scholar at the Center for Risk Analysis at the Harvard School of Public Health and a visiting professor at the Tufts New England Medical Center, in the Division of Clinical Decision Making, completing further training in the field of decision and cost effectiveness analyses.

Dr. Kotagal has published extensively in the field of neonatal outcomes research, including studies on neonatal cost models, and early discharge of newborns. She published the first landmark paper on early discharge programs in the NICU setting.

Dr. Kotagal was born in Bombay, India, where she received her undergraduate and her MBBS from the University of Bombay. She did a rotating internship at the University of Bombay from 1970-1971 and another rotating internship at Detroit General Hospital from 1971-1972.

At Children’s Hospital of Michigan, Dr. Kotagal completed her pediatric residency from 1972-1974 and went on to do a fellowship in neonatology from 1974-1975. She completed a fellowship in neonatal physiology at the University of Cincinnati from 1975-1977.

Dr. Kotagal is a senior faculty member of the Institute for Healthcare. She also serves as chair of the quality steering team of the Ohio Children’s Hospital Association, as a member of the advisory committee of the Toronto Patient Safety Center, as an associate editor of BMJ Quality and Safety and as a member of the Institute of Medicine.

Dr. Kotagal is also a member of various local, regional and national committees in the area of child health.

MBBS: Grant Medical College, University of Bombay, Bombay, India, 1970.

MSc: Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA, 1996.

Residency: Children's Hospital of Michigan, Detroit, MI.

Fellowship: Neonatology, Children's Hospital of Michigan, Detroit, MI; Neonatal Physiology, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH.

Certification: Pediatrics, 1975; Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine, 1977.

Research Areas

Quality Improvement

Additional Languages

Hindi

Publications

Caregivers' and providers' perspectives of social and medical care after pediatric liver transplant: Results from the multicenter SOCIAL-Tx study. Wadhwani, SI; Alvarado, A; Shifman, HP; Bautista, B; Yalung, J; Squires, JE; Campbell, K; Ebel, NH; Hsu, E; Vittorio, J; Kotagal, U; Lyles, CR; Ackerman, SL; Lai, JC. Liver Transplantation. 2024; 30:717-727.

Caregiver perspectives on the everyday medical and social needs of long-term pediatric liver transplant patients. Wadhwanii, SI; Barrera, AG; Shifman, HP; Baker, E; Bucuvalas, J; Gottlieb, LM; Kotagal, U; Rhee, SJ; Lai, JC; Lyles, CR. Liver Transplantation. 2022; 28:1735-1746.

Racial/ethnic disparities in wait-list outcomes are only partly explained by socioeconomic deprivation among children awaiting liver transplantation. Wadhwani, SI; Ge, J; Gottlieb, L; Lyles, C; Beck, AF; Bucuvalas, J; Neuhaus, J; Kotagal, U; Lai, JC. Hepatology. 2022; 75:115-124.

Center variation in long-term outcomes for socioeconomically deprived children. Wadhwani, SI; Huang, CY; Gottlieb, L; Beck, AF; Bucuvalas, J; Kotagal, U; Lyles, C; Lai, JC. American Journal of Transplantation. 2021; 21:3123-3132.

Neighborhood socioeconomic deprivation is associated with worse patient and graft survival following pediatric liver transplantation. Wadhwani, SI; Beck, AF; Bucuvalas, J; Gottlieb, L; Kotagal, U; Lai, JC. American Journal of Transplantation. 2020; 20:1597-1605.

Cooling The Hot Spots Where Child Hospitalization Rates Are High: A Neighborhood Approach To Population Health. Beck, AF; Anderson, KL; Rich, K; Taylor, SC; Iyer, SB; Kotagal, UR; Kahn, RS. Health Affairs. 2019; 38:1433-1441.

From the Blog

Kotagal Honored with City Proclamation at Retirement
Quality and Safety

Kotagal Honored with City Proclamation at Retirement

Uma R. Kotagal, MBBS, MSc7/2/2021

How to Cool Neighborhood Hospitalization Hotspots
Community Health

How to Cool Neighborhood Hospitalization Hotspots

Uma R. Kotagal, MBBS, MSc, Andrew F. Beck, MD, MPH ...9/4/2019

Kotagal Receives Procter Medallion
Quality and Safety

Kotagal Receives Procter Medallion

Uma R. Kotagal, MBBS, MSc7/1/2019

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4.6
Overall Patient Rating