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About NCIRE - The Veterans Health Research Institute
NCIRE's Impact on Veterans Veteran's Health Research Researchers by Name
There's no question that the San Francisco VA Medical Center, with the support of NCIRE, plays a major role in advancing veterans health care through research. The excellence of our NCIRE and SFVAMC investigators, all of whom are UC San Francisco faculty members, is fundamental to our success in developing cutting edge knowledge that will advance medical treatments of veterans and others, both locally and worldwide.

Paul Volberding, MD
Chair, NCIRE Board of Directors
Chief of Medicine, SFVAMC

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Stephen Bent, MD

Staff Physician, Medical Service, SFVAMC
Assistant Adjunct Professor of Medicine, UCSF

Email: stephen.bent@ucsf.edu

Safety and Efficacy of Complementary and Alternative Medicine

Dr. Bent's main research interest is the evaluation of the safety and efficacy of herbal remedies and dietary supplements. He served as the project director for one of the first large randomized controlled trials of saw palmetto for enlarged prostate, which gained international recognition for demonstrating that this commonly used herb was no more effective than placebo. Dr. Bent has also served as the principal investigator or co-investigator of several other large randomized controlled trials, including a study of a Chinese herbal remedy used to treat fatigue in the elderly and an internet-based study examining the efficacy of the herbs valerian (for sleep) and kava (for anxiety). Dr. Bent is an expert in evidence-based medicine and ambulatory care, and has coauthored textbooks in both areas.

Bent S, Kane C, Shinohara K, Neuhaus J, Goldberg H, Avins AL. 2006. A randomized controlled trial of saw palmetto for benign prostatic hyperplasia. N Engl J Med 354:557-66.

Bent S. Herbal medicine in the United States: Review of efficacy, safety, and regulation. 2008. J Gen Intern Med 23:854-9.