The San Diego County Medical Society (SDCMS), working collaboratively with San Diego Magazine for a decade, has continued and will continue to evolve our process for identifying those board-certified physicians within the county who are held in highest regard by their peers.
In 2014, we improved the process to ensure that all modes of practice were fairly represented in the selection.
Even so, measures of quality in healthcare are complex, varying by user and by intent. San Diego County’s physicians and patients alike understand that no process for identifying our communities’ many “top doctors”—however carefully constructed—will be without its limitations.
Our voting process, which has always been and will remain transparent, is the following: any board-certified physician in San Diego may vote for any board-certified doctors who practice within San Diego County to whom they would refer their patients and family members. Voting is open to all physicians, not just members of the Medical Society.
In 2014, more than 1,300 physicians voted with a selection rate of 7.4 percent. Each selectee was then reviewed by SDCMS to confirm his or her board certification, Medical Board of California standing, and current practice status.
This year’s process resulted in 732 physicians being honored by their peers.
This list, however, should be used with caution as a guide in choosing a physician for yourself. This list is by no means complete—most physicians are excellent and highly trained, and this was only one process to recognize a few of them. The best choice of a physician for a given person includes personal factors and intangibles that are best discussed with your doctor when a referral is made. Nurses and other healthcare professionals can also add insight into selecting a physician who best suits your individual needs.
Top Doctors 2014
J. Steven Poceta, MD
None of this should detract, however, from the recognition that those on this list fully deserve. These individuals have been identified by their peers as physicians to whom they would entrust the care of their own family members and patients. Among these honorees, 41 have been recognized by their peers in nine of the past 12 years, 47 have been recognized 10 of the past 12 years, 22 have been recognized 11 of the past 12 years, and seven have been recognized in all 12 years. There is no greater compliment one can receive from one’s colleagues!
We encourage all San Diego County physicians to participate in their county and state medical societies as we work toward the SDCMS vision—”Physicians United for a Healthy San Diego.”
It was the summer of 1999. MTV, The Matrix, and first-generation PlayStation glowed on tube TV sets all over America. What a time to be alive. Smartphones weren’t yet stealing people from the moment. Cultural was a shared reality. During the last few minutes of the monoculture, Tony Hawk executed the first-ever 900 at X Games V in San Francisco. That’s two and a half aerial rotations with a side of the dizzies.
The time had run out on the Vert Best Trick competition long before the 11th attempt when he pulled off the fateful feat. Nobody cared. Not the judges, not the competition, and certainly not the crowd. “Let that bird fly,” they said. Once the trick was landed, they partied like it was 1999 … because it was.
That was the tipping point when the skateboarding world exploded, going from counterculture to a national phenomenon. Shortly after that, “Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater” video game came out, introducing millions of kids to what skate culture looked like. Oh, the game had a killer punk soundtrack, too.
We can all thank Hawk for the globalization of skateboarding. But we can also recognize his local influence and how San Diego County continues to be a hub for skateboarders young and old, for competitors and street skaters. To see it all, go to Park De La Cruz in City Heights—or, heck, any other skatepark in the county—which, at 19,000 square feet, is about twice the size of the average skatepark and has signature features like an M-shaped transition ramp. The amount of talent that continues to evolve in this county is a testament to deep-rooted skate culture and world-class athletes supporting the next generation.
Photo Credit: Casiel Sanchez
The Skatepark
I’m a little early for a skate lesson with pro skater Mike Owen when I get to Linda Vista Skatepark. In the 2010s, Owen ranked as one of the world’s top bowl riders. He’s the founder of San Diego Skateboarding and has “helped thousands of kids, teens, and adults learn to skate safely, confidently, and with style,” the company’s site says. And now it’s my turn. We start the lesson on the nearby tennis courts, getting my basic foot mechanics down. Safety before style.
In terms of street plaza features, the massive Linda Vista Skatepark is loaded with rails, stairs, manuals, and ledges. There are more bowls than you can get from Cava: a flow bowl, backyard-style pool, and vert bowl. The main feature is a full pipe for advanced line riders. It’s a hell of a park, even if somebody just wants to watch the action from the 100-foot-long pedestrian skybridge overhead.
Right now, San Diego has over 50 public skateparks scattered throughout the county. “There are now more [skateparks], more resources for them, and more terrain,” Owen tells me. “Now, they’re offering different competitive style skateparks that help for competitions. The best parks have a variety of different terrain where you have things for beginners and bigger transitions. Not every town has that.”
San Diego, luckily, does. But despite the bounty, Owen believes there should still be more—public skateparks are safe spaces for all to learn and develop on-board skills. Without them, a huge portion of San Diego’s culture withers. Encinitas could be the next city to add a skatepark to the county’s roster: In early July, the Encinitas City Council appointed 12 local skaters and community members for the newly established Skate Feature Committee. In partnership with two councilmembers, the committee’s purpose is to design a working skatepark or feature for the city.
But like any big project, Owen says, it’s a long process to add another skatepark to the community.
“I wish it were easier,” he says. “When there are different contractors for different things, [there’s only] a certain amount of time to build. It gets tricky.”
Then there’s the matter of funding the actual construction and development of the skatepark. That usually comes from grants, fundraisers, and donations. For reference, Linda Vista Skatepark was built on a $4.46 million grant from the California Department of Housing and Community Development in 2014. With an additional $40,000 donated by the Tony Hawk Foundation, the park opened in 2018 and is the largest in San Diego’s Parks and Recreation system. The best way to get a skatepark in your neighborhood, Owen says, is to start a petition and reach out to your city.
Photo Credit: Blair Alley
The Street Skaters
Jordan Thrower’s first street skate sesh at San Diego City College in 2003 ended with a police chase. The campus was swarming with skaters riding rails, jumping stairs, and grinding tricks on benches, curbs, and ledges. When the cops got on their loudspeaker telling them not to run, everyone obviously ran. Back then, cops would give tickets and confiscate boards. The vibe has loosened since. “Now, the police don’t really care,” Thrower says. “They just make you leave. It’s not anything crazy.”
Street skating is when riders use real-world urban obstacles, rather than pristinely designed bowls or ramps—such as in college campuses, downtown areas, corporate buildings, and malls. Abandoned mini-golf courses and construction sites do the trick, too.
Thrower says the street skating hub here isn’t as huge as it once was. Thanks to modern technology and social media, skaters aren’t tied to any certain place to create skate videos. You know, those videos that could have been taken this year but have the low-fi vibe of 2004, where skaters carve down stairwells into parking lots, over mailboxes, or across park benches. The silver lining: Even though there are fewer street skaters than there once was, those who stayed in San Diego are still tight.
“Everyone skates with each other and knows each other here,” Thrower says. “In LA, it’s not really like that. It’s small there, but not everybody knows each other, and they don’t really skate with each other too much. They just have a lot of little crews.”
Back in 2015, Thrower started his own street team and brand that sells boards and shirts called Tantrum. The Tantrum team is split between San Diego and San Francisco. It doesn’t take much to be a part of a skate team. You just have to be a good hang.
“The way I pick people [for the team] is if I can get along with them,” he says. “It doesn’t even really matter if they’re that good. If you’re likable and funny, you can pretty much be on the team.”
Photo Credit: Marc Wierenega
The Future
Running it up to North County, a Vista-based nonprofit organization called Exposure Skate has been shaping up the youth since 2012. Its mission is to give more opportunities to otherwise underrepresented women, girls, and non-binary individuals by offering classes and camps. This, to build up confidence and community. We could all use a little bit of that, eh?
Thanks to Exposure Skate, 13-year-old Joey Yarbrough has found herself competing in the LA Olympic trials. (Her first time on a skateboard came at just 18 months old at an Exposure Skate Rising event.)
While competing for Team USA in Rome in June of this year, she finished 13th at the first Olympic qualifier for LA28. Currently ranked 21st in the world and 5th among American women, the young prodigy is blooming. And she’s in good company and mentorship from her biggest influence, Bryce Wettstein.
“She taught me at the first Exposure Skate Rising when I was little,” Yarbrough recalls. “I compete and skate with her all the time now, and it’s super fun. [At Exposure,] it feels so good to have someone there to help me whenever I need it. They’re like my family, always encouraging me and always there for me.”
Yarbrough will be just 15 years old when the Olympics go down in LA. She’s following the Olympic torch carried by other locals such as Wettstein, Ruby Lilley, Jordyn Barratt, and Exposure Skate’s Amelia Brodka.
“I’m working my hardest to get there,” she says. “I’ll also work my hardest to go higher in the Olympics, maybe on podium. That’s just my dream. So, hopefully it’ll come true.”
Jake Peterson is a San Diego-based journalist and culture writer. His work explores the city’s music scene, sports, local characters, and the offbeat corners of San Diego’s subcultures.
If magazines are like the adultier eldest daughters who know exactly how much anarchy they can get away with, zines are the far less predictable younger siblings going on whim and instinct. Those who draw on the walls around the house, DIY their own piercings, and experiment with different emo/straight-edge/back to emo phases (or not-phases). Boundaries and routines are what zines were created to rail against.
Walk into Verbatim Books’ zine corner, and this rebellion is immediately clear. Zines have no singular form, no clean category or definition. Vintage magazine scraps are collaged into new meaning alongside mini fandom zines. Single sheets of plain white printer paper are covered in nothing but black ballpoint pen. Repurposed hardback book covers are folded into something entirely new. Some are duct-taped together, others stapled. Some glossy, others matte. There are guides to anything and everything, comic panels, photography, hand-drawn cartoons, poetry, recipes, diaries, and ramblings that only make sense to the person who made them—and that’s on purpose.
Zines are creative magic. And with no rules, they’re incredibly accessible. Anyone can zine and have a voice, regardless of artistic training or work life experience.
You are your own Anna Wintour, Graydon Carter, Ruth Whitney.
San Diego–based zine creator Lyssette Williams specializes in mini zines—often limited to eight pages, they’re meditations in abbreviation. Outlining, thumbnailing, and revision all move quickly from idea to page. Larger projects, including Williams’ long-form graphic novel thesis, move at a slower pace. For those, she often returns to pen and ink, a choice that resists the over-editability of digital work.
Raised by a single mother and navigating mixed-race identity in a predominantly white town, she finds a home for processing it all in zines. Her work deals in identity, belonging, self-definition, and punk-rock childhood. But it isn’t always heavy; Williams creates a mini duck-themed zine called Backyard Duck Propaganda that’s hard not to love. “When I create, I think about what would have helped me find the words back then, what my younger self would’ve needed,” Williams says. “[Zines] put the tools in your hands and democratize art. They’re translations of memories and identities.”
Courtesy of Lyssette Williams
For Williams, a big reason she keeps creating is being surrounded by other creatives—a scene that extends across the border. She points to Verbatim and Comicbook Artists of San Diego, plus events like Zine Fest (October 17–18 this year at Woo in Barrio Logan) and Black Comix Day at the WorldBeat Cultural Center.
Zines have always been a road for subcultures. During the Harlem Renaissance, Black creatives like Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston self-published one issue of Fire!!, which inspired other Black authors. In the 1930s, zines (then called fanzines) were hubs for sci-fi nerds to write fanfiction, address the fandom, and create new characters. Superman actually made his public debut in a fanzine called Science Fiction (he was originally cast as a villain with a fully receded hairline). A couple decades later, zines about feminism and riot grrrl became subculture de rigueur.
The internet nearly killed zines, of course. But now, people tired of the algorithm’s firehose are finding comfort and renewed inspiration in analog. Zines, a salve for digital fatigue.
Courtesy of Duophobia
A giant figure in San Diego zine culture is Burn All Books. Founded by Amanda and Nick Bernal, BAB started as a risograph (digital screen printing) studio and turned into one of those places that keeps expanding the whole scene around it, even forming its own archive group, SCANNNERS. Since opening in January 2023, it has published over 35 works and collaborated with more than 100 artists, writers, and zinesters.
For Duophobia, the pseudonym for local twin sisters Alora and Kiani Dotson (affectionately known as the “possum twins”), zines make room for experimentation and play that doesn’t fit anywhere else. Room for eclectic cartoons and dirty jokes. For sticker-covered sketchbooks.
It’s that same brand of nostalgia you might feel when, say, you walk past the carcass of an abandoned mall and see a faded cartoon mural. Their work lives somewhere between childhood and adulthood, where being unserious is taken very, very seriously.
“We’re born and raised in San Diego, and the community of artists here is a main reason we started publishing,” Kiani Dotson says. “There are people here like Trixxie Land who run open art gatherings. Show up, and you’re part of it.”
Land, a zinester herself (she made 250 single-page zines during 2020’s lockdown), is all about storytelling over hierarchy. Art shouldn’t be about gatekeeping or intimidation, she says. So she holds open-invite arts shows at Subterranean Coffee.
Courtesy of Lyssette Williams
Duophobia regularly share their work at local galleries like Subterranean, filling that lowbrow space with pieces that answer: “What would’ve made us laugh as kids?” Children are often the first to pick up their zines, unfolding them in every direction while parents briefly panic at the impulsive destruction. The twins always step in. “No, no, it’s okay,” they say, before showing how one sheet of paper folds into an entire little book. “It’s like magic.” More often than not, the kids leave with a tiny zine tucked under a tiny arm, future San Diego zinesters in the making.
When asked what a zine really is, Alora Dotson’s response was simple: “It’s anything. Literally anything. The more genuine you are, the more people are going to hear what you have to say. Your voice matters, even if it’s just a silly joke or story. People want to hear about it.”
Not a perfect definition? Exactly. Zines inherently resist categories. Want to turn a single playing card into a storybook? Do it. What about your favorite graffiti artist’s signature tag at Prince Memorial Skatepark? Turn it into a zine.
Isabella Dallas is a freelance writer for San Diego Magazine and the Arts and Culture Editor at The Daily Aztec in her final year at San Diego State University. She previously worked as an editorial intern for SDM, but when she’s not writing, you can find her trying the best coffee spots in SD, devouring the latest rom-coms, and indulging in anything and everything pop culture.
A perfectly designed home rarely happens by accident. Those kitchens that feel effortless and rooms that seem to tell a story the second you walk in? They’re usually the work of someone who knows exactly what they’re doing.
It’s knowing which ideas will actually work, which materials will hold up over time, and how to turn a collection of choices into a space that feels intentional. That’s where a professional interior designer comes in.
For the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID) California San Diego Chapter, the goal is to help people see interior design as more than just the finished look. Behind every well-designed space is a process built on technical expertise. Designers are educated in everything from professional software and construction details to building codes, space planning, materials, and functionality.
Courtesy of ASID
“People don’t always realize how much goes on behind the scenes,” Kirsten Recce , current president of the ASID California San Diego Chapter, says. “Our designers are not just doing furniture placement and color selection and picking out new fluffy pillows. That’s not what they’re trained for.”
ASID members bring formal education, continued learning, and industry knowledge to their projects, helping create spaces that are not only beautiful, but designed to work. A paint color that changes completely depending on the lighting. A material that looks beautiful in a showroom but doesn’t make sense for everyday life. A layout that photographs well but doesn’t function for the people living there. These are the details where professional guidance can make all the difference.
Still, one of the biggest misconceptions about hiring an interior designer is that it’s reserved for massive renovations, luxury homes, or people who already know exactly what they want. The process can feel intimidating. Where do you begin? Is a designer worth the investment? What if you only need help with one room?
ASID’s answer: start with one hour.
ASID’s Spruce Up events break down one of the biggest barriers between homeowners and professional design: knowing where to begin. Held twice a year, the community program gives homeowners the chance to work directly with an ASID designer through a one-hour, $125 consultation in their own home. Whether you’re looking for advice on furniture placement, window treatments, kitchen and bath updates, remodeling ideas, vacation rentals, color selections or something else entirely, the upcoming September 2026 event offers an approachable way to get expert guidance before committing to a full project. Signups are open through Sept. 7, with consultations taking place Sept. 21 through Oct. 31. Proceeds benefit ASID San Diego’s educational and community programs. Register here!
Courtesy of ASID
“It’s a great opportunity for people who are in that exploratory phase,” Recce says. “Maybe they’re not sure they want to hire an interior designer yet, or they think it sounds daunting or expensive. This gives them a chance to discover what working with a designer is actually like.”
Design is personal. A good designer isn’t just creating a beautiful room; they’re helping create a space that fits the way someone lives.
“We’re a resource to all of San Diego County,” Recce says. “It doesn’t cost anything to pick up the phone and call and ask. We’ll answer.”
Best Place to Buy Original Art Without Needing a Tiny Paddle
Goblin Shark Emporium
Almost everything in this Oceanside shop is made by local artists and independent weirdos, and almost none of it requires a gallerist’s budget. Goblin Shark Emporium rotates a new featured artist every month between the vinyl crates, blacklight posters, and hilariously specific stickers, so you can walk out with original work and a tarot reading to contemplate as you sip your Banana Dang Coffee from a couple storefronts down.
Best Hidden Gem
Through the Fold
Tucked within the potting tables and ferns of Mission Hills Nursery, the oldest nursery in Southern California and a Kate Sessions original, sits Through the Fold, the sweet indie bookstore that mother-daughter team Gail Levine and Jennifer Medeiros hand-built and opened in late April. Two retired educators and lifelong bibliophiles run it like a neighborhood living room: three book clubs, toddler story time, and a summer camp for the 7-to-12 set. It’s the rare retail run that smells like soil and new paperbacks, which is to say, like a very specific kind of heaven.
Open since 1993 under the unbeatable tagline “Books of Martians, Murder, Magic, and Mayhem,” this Rosecrans Street institution is the city’s portal for anyone who would rather be on a different planet. Load up on sci-fi, horror, and fantasy, then stick around for the weekly Dungeons & Dragons campaign, because the only thing better than reading about another universe is rolling a d20 inside one.
Best Stop into Trinket Town
Library Shop
On the ground floor of the downtown Central Library, tucked into the Joan and Irwin Jacobs Common, sits the Library Shop, a tightly curated gift store stocked with presents and trinkets you didn’t know you needed: wind-up kitchen timers, specialty pencils, felt coasters in colors cheerful enough to overcome the first half of the Padres’ season—you get it. Every dollar funds the San Diego Public Library system, which makes the shop’s official “Guilt-Free Shopping” motto the rare slogan that holds up. Come for a paperback, leave having formed a genuine emotional attachment to a $4 pencil.
The window at this North Park shop is alive: a front-of-house catio where adoptable rescue cats audition for your heart while you pretend to be just browsing. From there, a literal catwalk runs along the ceiling to a back resting room (because existing around inferior beings is exhausting for cats). Owner Vera Blatchley of Purrgatory stocks the full cat-lover arsenal, plus a wall of gifts for the feline who already has nine of everything. Fan favorite: a retro-style, bubblegum-pink Kit-Cat Clock.
Best San Diego Mood Board
Club Paradise
Surf art’s everywhere, but it’s somehow always a little kooky. Painter Andy Davis’ style captured that elemental soul, making him one of the most successful surf artists of the last few decades (check his giant mural at Town and Country Resort). His tiny Encinitas storefront, Club Paradise, is a gallery-slash-gift shop that stocks his paintings and prints—and he’s using the space as a culture club for local and touring creatives.
Best Limited-Edition Tan Line
Tulux Resortwear
Tulux is the Pacific Beach swimwear label out of Cass Street, where designer Yamhed Torres turns the whole Tulum fantasy into bold, limited-run bikinis. This year, Vogue México y Latinoamérica named her one of just 10 emerging designers to watch, so each suit comes with the kind of credentials that practically books its own sunset getaway. Everything is one and done: When a piece sells, it’s gone for good, which is either smart scarcity or the universe telling you to commit.
Free lotto tickets at crystal shops? Yes, please. Pacific Beads owner Shlomo Gruer greets you at the door of this Clairemont Mesa warehouse with 4,000 square feet of crystals, geodes, and beads by the bin. You come for wholesale amethyst and sterling findings; you leave holding a fistful of healing stones and a statistically remote shot at early retirement. Need another reason to visit? Owner Gruer has his own line of jewelry, and Pacific Beads also hosts jewelry-making classes.
Best Nostalgia Purchase
123 Sweetsss
El Cajon’s Parkway Plaza could look radically different in the near future, as city officials are hatching plans to reinvent the one-time community and commercial center. Inflection points of iconic structures are always compelling times to visit and tabulate your own urban-planning daydreams. As you do, hit the first NAMA-certified automatic cotton candy vending machine in the country. Push a button, and 123 Sweetsss spins you a fresh cloud of childhood in under a minute. No carnival, no county fair admission, no sweaty teenager in a paper hat required.
For thousands of years, the Kumeyaay who lived in this area called a mountain south of Julian Cush-pii, meaning “sharp peak.” Then, after the Civil War, Confederate sympathizers saw that same mountain and decided to rename it Stonewall Peak—after General Stonewall Jackson. The name stuck for nearly a century and a half, until Cuyamaca Rancho State Park announced earlier this year that the name will return to its original, Cush-pii. Hike to the summit for expansive views of the Coronado Islands to the west and Mexico to the south.
Courtesy of Culture Shock San Diego
Best Pop and Lock Spot
Culture Shock
In 1993, Angie Bunch gathered a group of hip-hop dancers—called Culture Shock Dance Troupe—and gave them a space to practice and perform. As hip hop grew through the ’90s, so did Culture Shock. It has since become a nonprofit, a space for young and old, beginner and expert dancers. Culture Shock has also expanded to Los Angeles, Oakland, Las Vegas, Chicago, Atlanta, New York City, and Washington, D.C., as well as Ottawa and Toronto, Canada.
In 2019, Amanda Leach created the Yoga Box method, which takes high-energy flows and adds strength-building poses in heated, vibey, lava-lamp-lit studios. What started on Grand Avenue in Pacific Beach has spread to 15 locations across the county, with even more trickling into Denver, Chicago, and Brooklyn. The best part? Mindfulness newbies who can’t touch their toes and six-packed contortionists can hang in the same class. You can customize each session based on your ability and fitness level.
Courtesy of Fit Athletic Club
Best Leg Day Turned Social Hour
Fit Mission Beach
A gym taking over a historic beachfront pool sounds like the setup for a new season of Love Island, but Fit Mission Beach operating the nearly 100-year-old Plunge at Belmont Park is real. The independent fitness brand has spent the past several years building a loyal following through group fitness classes, community events, and a members’ social club overlooking the ocean. Upstairs, members can work remotely, meet friends, or hang out long after their workout ends. Between the Plunge, the coworking-style lounge, and a packed calendar of events, Fit has evolved into something bigger than a gym. It’s a clubhouse for San Diego’s fitness crowd.
Best Place to Learn What a Vagus Is
Breathe Degrees
The wellness world is finally transitioning away from HIIT workouts and cult-like spin classes, where your heart rate hits Zone 5 within minutes and stays there until cooldown. Good. At Breathe Degrees, wellness takes the form of zenned-out communal breathing sessions or vagus nerve–activating cold plunges. Breathwork is said to boost your mood in the short term and improve your heart health in the long term, and maybe that’s why everyone’s coming back for more. You can’t run into someone in Carlsbad who hasn’t dropped into at least one breathwork session, and now the studio has opened a second location in Liberty Station.
Photo Credit: Shot On Us
Best Pilates Studio for People With Tiny Roommates
Soul Pilates and Care
Pilates wasn’t just popular this year; it was practically a requirement for maintaining your San Diego residency. New studios seemed to appear weekly across San Diego, each promising stronger cores and better posture, but Soul Pilates and Care found a way to stand out by addressing a challenge many parents know well: finding time to exercise at all. Fitness doesn’t have to compete with parenting responsibilities. Parents can drop their kids off with trained caregivers while they head into reformer classes, eliminating one of the biggest barriers to working out. The studio has earned strong reviews for both its instruction and family-friendly approach.
The Hotel del Coronado’s sweeping $550 million restoration touched nearly every corner of the historic resort, but one of the most anticipated unveilils was the debut of its redesigned spa. The oceanfront wellness destination now features 21 treatment rooms, a relaxation lounge, a sauna, steam room, and a treatment menu inspired by the coastal environment just steps away. The redesign blends the Del’s Victorian legacy with a cleaner, more contemporary aesthetic, creating a space that feels distinctly SoCal rather than generic luxury hotel. For locals who don’t have time for a vacation, it’s the next best thing.
Best Cheers Without Beers
Good News Bar
As non-alcoholic beverages continue their meteoric rise, Good News Bar has become one of San Diego’s most compelling arguments for a booze-free evening. The University Heights hotspot serves a menu of carefully crafted zero-proof cocktails that borrow techniques and ingredients from traditional cocktail programs (it’s not just fancy juices and soda water), minus the hangover. The space also hosts regular community events and has quickly become a gathering place for everyone from sober San Diegans to the merely sober-curious. In a nightlife industry built around alcohol sales, Good News proved there’s plenty of demand for connection without the buzz.
Chemotherapy and radiation have long been considered gold standards of cancer treatment, but they can cause severe side effects. A promising new approach called theranostics—a combination of “therapeutics” and “diagnostics”—could offer patients with certain types of metastatic cancers new hope. It’s a two-step process that uses a drug that binds to specific receptors on cancer cells. Advanced imaging detects this radioisotope, allowing doctors to then use a second radioisotope that binds to the cancer cells and destroys them. Click here to learn more about how specialists at Scripps Cancer Center are using theranostics.
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