Among the Academies: Transforming Lives Before Birth
Diana Farmer’s Journey as a Fetal Surgeon and Physician-Scientist
As one of the world’s first fetal surgeons, Diana Farmer has long been focused on the smallest of patients.
She specializes in treating birth defects inside and outside of the womb, treating congenital anomalies and cancer and performing airway and intestinal surgeries. In the late 1990s, she became the first woman in the world to perform open fetal surgery.
Farmer believes her research could not have happened without collaboration across UC Davis. Farmer and her School of Veterinary Medicine colleagues collaborated closely in the early stages of a clinical trial, studying spina bifida in sheep and treating bulldogs.
“It has really been a spectacular, enriching part of my career here,” Farmer said. “That’s one of the things that brought me here — it was just really exciting to advance human health in the only University of California that had a vet school and had an agriculture school.”
Farmer also referenced the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine’s One Health Institute, highlighting the intersection of animals, people, plants, and the environment.
“This is just such a rich place to do science,” she added.