In Memoriam: Dr. Jimmy H. Hara, MD, FAAFP
It is with profound sadness that we share the news of the passing of our dear colleague, Dr. Jimmy H. Hara, MD, FAAFP, Professor of Family Medicine in our College of Medicine and former Interim Associate Dean.
Dr. Hara’s life was a testament to medicine as a calling. A graduate of the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine, he completed his residency at UCLA-VA Greater Los Angeles and went on to a career that shaped generations of physicians in our region. He served for twenty-five years as Director of the Family Medicine Residency Program at Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center, and later as Director of Graduate Medical Education for Kaiser Permanente Southern California, overseeing five hospitals and twenty residency programs. He held the title of Residency Director Emeritus at Kaiser, was Clinical Professor of Family Medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, and at Charles R. Drew University he was instrumental in helping establish our own Family Medicine Residency Program.
His commitment to the underserved was unwavering. Dr. Hara volunteered at Venice Family Clinic for more than fifty years, beginning in 1971 and served on its Board of Directors for three decades. He held leadership roles with Physicians for Social Responsibility-Los Angeles for over forty years, chaired California’s Healthcare Workforce Policy Commission, and was the first and only physician to serve as a Commissioner of the Los Angeles Fire Department.
Born in a World War II Japanese American internment camp and resettled in South Los Angeles, Dr. Hara carried his lived understanding of injustice into a lifelong commitment to health equity. “A community is only as strong as its weakest link,” he once said. He lived that conviction in every patient he treated and every resident he mentored.
To many of us, he was a founding father of family medicine education in our region, a teacher of teachers, and a quiet conscience for our profession. For those of us in the College of Medicine, Dr. Hara’s warmth, integrity, and unwavering dedication to underserved communities embodied the very mission of this institution. His influence on Family Medicine education in Los Angeles and on countless physicians who passed through his programs is immeasurable.
Our thoughts and deepest condolences are with his family, his colleagues, and all who were touched by his life and work.