Thomas Rutledge

Thomas Rutledge, Ph.D., is a Professor-in-Residence in the Department of Psychiatry at UC San Diego. As a researcher, Dr. Rutledge has authored more than 100 journal articles and book chapters in scientific publications and been an investigator on dozens of federally funded grants from the National Institute of Health, Department of Defense, and Department of Veterans Affairs. His work focuses on behavioral and psychological treatments for chronic medical conditions such as heart disease, obesity, chronic pain, and diabetes. As a practitioner, Dr. Rutledge is a staff psychologist at the VA San Diego Healthcare System where he directs behavioral medicine services for Veterans receiving care in the weight control, diabetes, and pain clinics. He has also been board certified as a clinical health psychologist by the American Board of Professional Psychology (ABPP) since 2010. Dr. Rutledge is a Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at UCSD. He received his Bachelor’s degree from the University of Alaska, Anchorage in 1994, and subsequently completed Master’s and Doctoral studies in clinical psychology at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Rutledge completed his clinical internship at the Toronto Hospital, and later completed postdoctoral training at the University of Pittsburgh in their Cardiovascular Behavioral Medicine fellowship program. He currently works in the VA Medical Center in La Jolla. His research focuses on the overlap between mental health and chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease, obesity, and chronic pain. Dr. Rutledge is a behavioral medicine researcher focusing on the overlap between mental health and chronic illness and developing behavioral treatments for chronic disease management. His recent funded research activity includes clinical trials evaluating the efficacy of cognitive behavioral treatments for chronic pain, nutritional interventions for obesity, and meditation and tai chi interventions for conditions such as PTSD and heart failure