Robert Lustig, MD

Pediatric endocrinologist

Dr. Robert Lustig, a pediatric endocrinologist at UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital, is nationally recognized in the field of neuroendocrinology, with an emphasis on the regulation of energy balance by the central nervous system. He is interested in how biochemical, neural, hormonal and genetic influences contribute to obesity in children and adults. He defined a syndrome of vagally mediated beta-cell hyperactivity that leads to excessive production of insulin and obesity, which may occur in up to 20 percent of the obese population and is treatable with insulin suppression. He also is studying the association between hyperinsulinemia, or the presence of excess insulin in the blood, and cardiovascular disease and is developing methods to evaluate and prevent this in children.

Lustig earned a bachelor's degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and a medical degree from Cornell University Medical College. He completed a pediatric residency at St. Louis Children's Hospital and a clinical fellowship in pediatric endocrinology at UCSF. From there, he spent six years as a postdoctoral fellow in neuroendocrinology at Rockefeller University in New York. Lustig is a professor of clinical pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology at UCSF.

Endocrinology Clinic
1825 Fourth St., Sixth Floor
San Francisco, CA 94158
Phone: (415) 353-7337
Fax: (415) 476-8214

Pediatric Brain Tumor Center
1825 Fourth St., Sixth Floor
San Francisco, CA 94158
Phone: (415) 353-2986
Fax: (415) 353-2657

• Obesity