Dr. Michael Velez, MD, MTM?

Dr. Michael Velez, MD, MTM

General Practitioner

8700 BEVERLY BLVD # 2900A WEST HOLLYWOOD CA, 90048 Show map

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About

Michael Velez, MD, MTM is an Anesthesiologist, General practitioner, and Aesthetic Medicine Proceduralist & Injector currently serving his patients at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center located in Los Angeles, California. To begin his career, Dr. Velez earned his medical degree (MD) in 2017 from Thomas Jefferson University's Sidney Kimmel Medical College after earning a Master of Translational Medicine degree (MTM) from UC Berkeley and UCSF where he developed novel health technologies and medical devices from concept to commercialization.

In order to provide his patients with the best care, he specializes in Aesthetic Medicine & Non-surgical Dermatology & Plastic Surgery procedures. Furthermore, he is a professional member of the American Society of Anesthesiologists and the American Society of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine to stay up to date in his field.

Education and Training

Thomas Jefferson - SKMC MD 2017

UC Berkeley & UC San Francisco MTM 2016

George Washington University BS 2011

Provider Details

Male English, Spanish

Dr. Michael Velez, MD, MTM

Dr. Michael Velez, MD, MTM's Expert Contributions

My Answers

What type of sedation is used for toe surgery?
The type of anesthesia you receive depends on the type of surgery you are having, your health, and your preferences. Local and regional anesthesia are similar to what you receive at the dentist. You receive a series of injections that prevent nerve impulses from being conducted, thus blocking any pain you may feel. A local anesthetic is used to numb a small area, like a toe, while a regional blocks pain in a large area, such as your leg. With both these forms of anesthesia, you remain completely awake, so you can respond to questions and instructions from your foot doctor. Some of the benefits of these types of anesthesia is that there is no increased risk of heart attack or stroke as there is with general anesthesia. They are also the most affordable forms of anesthesia. Conscious sedation involves the use of a mild sedative, delivered via an IV by your foot surgeon. You will not fall asleep with this kind of sedation, but you will feel extremely relaxed. Because this kind of anesthesia does not block pain, it is often combined with a local or regional option. Conscious sedation is not ideal for long procedures and can cause nausea and headaches in some patients. If you are nervous about your procedure, your podiatrist may recommend conscious sedation. When you have general anesthesia, you will be put in a deep state of sleep throughout your operation, so you don’t experience any kind of pain. You also will not have knowledge of the surgery. General anesthesia comes with risks, which at the very least, are greater in smokers and in people who are overweight. Your surgeon, and anesthesiologist the day of, will help you determine which is the best fit for your operation. READ MORE
Are lidocaine injections painful?
Lidocaine, can cause pain (brief burning pain/sting) for approximately 15 seconds until the numbing effect begins. It is possible that this pain is caused because lidocaine is acidic and burns during its injection. Some physicians believe that reducing the acidity of lidocaine by mixing it with sodium bicarbonate will reduce the initial pain of injecting the lidocaine. Both approaches - injecting 1% lidocaine alone and injecting 1% lidocaine mixed with sodium bicarbonate - are used as routine standards of care today. Based on existing studies on the matter, buffering and warming of the lidocaine solution before injection are probably the simplest and most effective measures to reducing the already minor pain that comes with lidocaine injections. READ MORE
How long is local anesthesia for hand surgery?
Local anesthesia used for hand surgery refers to anesthetics for a small body area and is very common in hand surgery. Numbing medicine (Lidocaine, benzocaine, marcaine or a pharmacological relative) is injected at the site of surgery. There are different types of local anesthetic medications that last for different amounts of time. Some may last for only *one or two hours*, and others *may last for eight hours or more*. When local anesthesia is used alone, the patient can be wide awake during the surgery. Sometimes, epinephrine may be mixed with the local anesthetic to temporarily constrict the blood vessels and limit excessive bleeding. This may temporarily make the skin look pale where the medication is injected. With regional anesthesia, specific parts of the body are put to sleep by injecting numbing medicine through a needle or catheter placed along the path of the targeted nerves. This may be around the collarbone or neck, under the arm, at the wrist, in the palm, or around the finger. As with local anesthesia, relaxing medication may be given through an IV line, as well. Regional anesthesia uses numbing medications that can provide between READ MORE
Do you get sedation for hand surgery?
Hello! These days most hand surgery procedures can now be performed under local anesthesia in the clinic setting, without the need for sedation or general anesthesia, using a technique called WALANT, which stands for wide awake local anesthesia no tourniquet. A regional anesthetic is a common choice for hand surgery, as it makes use of anesthetic medication to selectively block the sensation of the nerves in a specific area of the body. An anesthetic medication would be injected through a needle along the nerve path. READ MORE

Areas of expertise and specialization

AnesthesiaClinical Medicine

Faculty Titles & Positions

Clinical Advisor & Mentor Cedars-Sinai Accelerator 2021 - Present

Awards

Joseph F. Rodgers, MD Memorial Award 2021 Thomas Jefferson University
Gates Millennium Scholar 2015 Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Professional Memberships

California Society for Anesthesiologists
American Society of Anesthesiologists
American Society of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine
American Medical Association
American Society for Aesthetics

Charities and Philanthropic Endeavors

Global Health Brigades

Areas of research

Anesthesia, Aesthetic Medicine, Health Innovation & Design

- Health Technology - Digital Health & Medical Device Invention & commercialization

Peer-Reviewed Online PublicationsVelez M.R., (2020, October 15). The Family Meeting. https://in-training.org/the-family-meeting-20300Research Abstracts & Presentations1. Ries R, Velez M, Jennings E, Komlo C, Hutchinson M, Pugliese R., Ku B, Fields M. Strategy for deploying large-scale volunteer continuous bag valve tube (BVT). Poster presentation at: COVID Innovations: Thomas Jefferson University House Staff Quality Improvement and Patient Safety Conference; May 28, 2020; Philadelphia, PA.2. Velez M, Komlo C, Morris M, Reis R. Cross-sectional Analysis of Sound Levels in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at: Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. Poster presentation at the Thomas Jefferson University Chapter of Sigma Xi Student Research Day. Apr 18, 2019; Philadelphia, PA.3. Velez M, Swift L, Posnack N, Sarvazyan N. Engineered cardiac fibers – A biological pump to aid venous flow. Poster Presentation at the Sidney Kimmel Medical College AOA Research Symposium, April 16th, 2018; Philadelphia, PA.4. Velez M, Wong S, Jordan A, Eleswarpu C, Roux R, Chumfong I, Rangarajan S, Suh, I. Lamprey: A Novel Vacuum Grasper To Reduce Tissue Injury in Laparascopy. Oral Presentation at the 2017 Master of Translational Medicine Final Symposium at the University of California, San Francisco, June 17th, 2017; San Francisco, CA.5. Wong S, Velez M, Jordan A, Eleswarpu C, Roux R, Chumfong I, Rangarajan S, Suh, I. Lamprey: A Novel Surgical Soft Tissue Manipulator/Retraction Device. Oral Presentation at the University of California San Francisco Surgical Innovations Meeting, May 9th, 2017; San Francisco, CA.6. Wong S, Velez M, Jordan A, Eleswarpu C, Roux R, Chumfong I, Rangarajan S, Suh, I. A Novel Vacuum Grasper To Reduce Tissue Injury in Laparascopy. Poster Presentation at the SAGES 2017 Annual Meeting, March 22-25th, 2017; Houston, TX.7. Velez M, Swift L, Posnack N, Sarvazyan N. Engineered cardiac fibers – A biological pump to aid venous flow. Poster Presentation – 1st place at the George Washington University Annual Research Symposium, April 16th, 2015; Washington, D.C.8. Swift L, Velez M, Posnack N, Sarvazyan N. Engineered cardiac fibers – A biological pump to aid venous flow. Poster Presentation at the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society Americas (TERMIS-AM) Annual Conference & Exposition 2014, December 16th, 2014; Washington, D.C.

Pitch Presentations, Business Plan Competitions & Health Design Workshops1. Velez M, Kurzum J, Varotsis D, Varotsis E, Juckett L. Calmpress: Rapid & Discreet Deep Pressure Therapy Vest. Pitch Presentation – Finalist at the Annual Jefferson University Health Hack: Reinventing Healthcare Access & Delivery – Wearables Category, November 1st - 3rd, 2019; Philadelphia, PA.2. Velez M, Ries R, Komlo C, Morris M, Shine K. HUSH: Noise Reduction Interventions for Improving NICU Outcomes in the Hospital. Oral Pitch Presentation – 1st place at the Annual JeffDESIGN Tradeshow & Design Research Symposium, January 30th, 2019; Philadelphia, PA.3. Velez M, Katzenstein A, Sterling R. “Global Perspectives on Addiction Psychiatry” – Global Opioid Crisis Innovation Workshop & Narcan Training at the Annual Global Health & Innovation Interdisciplinary Approaches Conference, November 16th, 2018; Philadelphia, PA.4. Velez M, Ku B, Beckerman J, Man Man Music. Sonic Humanism: Humanizing Healthcare through Sound. Health Design Workshop at the Jefferson Health Design Lab at Sidney, June 16th, 2018; Philadelphia, PA.5. Velez M, Bon Ku, MD, Geoff Hayden, MD, Rob Pugliese, Pharm.D. Health Design Bootcamp for Executives. Health Design Workshop at the Jefferson Health Design Lab, June 7-9th, 2018; Philadelphia, PA.6. Velez M, Fels S, Levy H, Lee A, Massenzio E Ku B. MediMeals: A Novel Medically Tailored Meal Delivery App. Oral Pitch Presentation – 1st place at the Annual JeffDESIGN Tradeshow & Design Research Symposium, March 28th, 2018; Philadelphia, PA.7. Velez M, Wong S, Jordan A, Eleswarpu C, Suh, I. Lamprey: A Novel Vacuum Grasper To Reduce Tissue Injury in Laparascopy. Business Plan Pitch Competition – 2nd Place at the ASAIO 63rd Annual Conference –“Patient-Centric Innovation - Artificial Organs Beyond the Conventional”, June 21-24th, 2017; Chicago, IL.8. Velez M, Wong S, Jordan A, Eleswarpu C, Suh, I. Lamprey: A Novel Vacuum Grasper To Reduce Tissue Injury in Laparascopy. Business Plan Pitch Competition – Finalist at the 2017 VentureWell BMEidea Competition at the MD&M East Conference, June 13-15th, 2017; New York, NY.9. Velez M, Wong S, Jordan A, Eleswarpu C, Suh, I. Lamprey: A Novel Vacuum Grasper To Reduce Tissue Injury in Laparascopy. Business Plan Pitch Competition – 3rd Place at the 2017 Rudd Family Foundation Big Ideas Contest – Hardware for Good Category at the University of California, Berkeley, May 9th, 2017; Berkeley, CA.

10. Velez M, Wong S, Jordan A, Eleswarpu C, Suh, I. Lamprey: A Novel Vacuum Grasper To Reduce Tissue Injury in Laparascopy. Business Plan Pitch Competition – Finalist at the 2017 Stanford BASES Challenge, January 11th, 2017; Stanford, CA.

From my grant-funded fellowship in the Sarvazyan Lab at the GWU School of Medicine, I learned to excel in a fast-paced biomedical research environment as both an independent experimentalist and a cooperative problem-solver. My research involved harvesting and culturing neonatal rat ventricular cardiomyocytes to engineer 3D cardiac tissue constructs that would serve as peristaltic pumps for the treatment of chronic venous insufficiency (CVI). I also used surgical techniques to implant tissue constructs into animal models (pigs, rats, and rabbits) to test their viability. Moreover, I worked as a research assistant at the Attention and Cognition lab at GWU and at a clinical research center for early to late-stage pharmaceutical trials in the Division of Nutrition and Endocrinology in Miami.