Gary N. Holland, MD is the Jack H. Skirball Professor of Ocular Inflammatory Diseases, and Chief of the Cornea-External Ocular Disease & Uveitis Division of the Department of Ophthalmology, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, and is a member of the Jules Stein Eye Institute. He is first recipient of the David May II Professorship of Ophthalmology (2002), which honors one of the founding members of the Institute's Board of Trustees and a prominent member of the Los Angeles community. He is also Director of the Ocular Inflammatory Disease Center, Jules Stein Eye Institute, and Director of the Institute's Clinical Research Center, which was created to provide support services for individuals engaged in patient-based research.
Dr. Holland grew up in southern California where he undertook much of his training. He obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in biological sciences at the University of California, Irvine (1975) and his medical degree at the UCLA School of Medicine, where he also completed his residency training in ophthalmology. He undertook fellowship training in both uveitis/external ocular diseases (Francis I. Proctor Foundation, University of California, San Francisco, 1983-1984) and corneal diseases and surgery (Emory University, 1984-1985). He returned to the UCLA Department of Ophthalmology as a faculty member in 1985.
Dr. Holland is especially interested in infectious diseases of the eye. In 1981, he was the first to describe the ophthalmic manifestations of AIDS. He has continued to be involved in the study of CMV retinitis and other AIDS-related ophthalmic problems. Dr. Holland also has a long-standing interest in ocular toxoplasmosis. He is currently working with investigators in Brazil, Europe, and the United States to understand the clinical features of ocular toxoplasmosis more thoroughly and to identify factors related to severity of disease. A third area of clinical and research interest is chronic anterior uveitis in children, as seen in those with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA). He is currently investigating risk factors for development of vision-threatening complications in children with JIA-associated uveitis.
Since 1993, Dr. Holland has served as Associate Editor of the American Journal of Ophthalmology and is Co-Editor of the textbook, Ocular Infection & Immunity. He is a past President of the American Uveitis Society, and is a member of both the International Uveitis Study Group (IUSG) and of the International Ocular Inflammation Society (IOIS), serving on its International Council. In 2003, Dr. Holland was chosen to present the LX Edward Jackson Memorial Lecture "Ocular Toxoplasmosis: A global reassessment". He is Co-Editor of the textbook Ocular Infection & Immunity. In 2009, he was awarded the Jane Wyman Humanitarian Award by the Arthritis Foundation - Southern California Chapter, for his work on behalf of children with uveitis.