About
Hong trained at Harvard Medical School (MD, 1999, with distinction in research) and UCLA (PhD in cellular and molecular pathology), then completed internal medicine residency at Scripps Clinic and a clinical nutrition fellowship at UCLA Medical Center. He is dual board-certified in internal medicine and clinical nutrition, and serves as founding director of USC's Center for Clinical Nutrition with joint faculty appointments at the Keck School of Medicine and the Leonard Davis School of Gerontology. At Lifeforce, he advises on the nutrition, metabolic-health, and biomarker interpretation layer of the platform.
What to Know
Signature approach
Hong's clinical lens is nutrition as chronic-disease treatment; obesity, metabolic syndrome, and nutrition-related disorders read and managed through labs, body composition, and targeted intervention rather than advice-only counselling. His research runs alongside the practice: fasting-mimicking diet trials with Valter Longo, GLP-1 perioperative work with USC orthopaedics, and outpatient nutrition-care cost studies. At Lifeforce, that approach shows up in the membership's biomarker-led metabolic and weight-management protocols.
What sets them apart
- Founding director, USC Center for Clinical Nutrition; runs one of the country's few hospital-based clinical nutrition programmes, with joint appointments at the Keck School of Medicine and Leonard Davis School of Gerontology.
- Active PubMed author; 50+ indexed publications on fasting-mimicking diets, GLP-1 medications, nutrition intervention economics, and obesity surgery risk, including a 2024 Nature Communications paper co-authored with Valter Longo.
- Dual board certification in internal medicine and clinical nutrition; an uncommon combination that sits behind Lifeforce's metabolic and weight-management protocols.
Expertise
Focus areas
Patient types
Credentials
Education
MD, Medicine (with distinction in research)
Harvard Medical School (1999)
PhD, Cellular and Molecular Pathology
University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)
Board certifications
Internal Medicine
American Board of Internal Medicine
Formal certification that a physician has completed residency training and passed the standardised exam for adult medicine.
Clinical Nutrition
American Board of Physician Nutrition Specialists
Specialist certification in the clinical application of nutrition; how food, micronutrients, and dietary intervention affect disease and health.
Residency
Internal Medicine
Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation
Fellowship
Clinical Nutrition
UCLA Medical Center
Years in practice
27
NPI
1225056831
Affiliations
Scientific Advisor
Thought Leadership
Publications
- Fasting-mimicking diet causes hepatic and blood markers changes indicating reduced biological age and disease risk · Nature Communications, 2024
- Fasting mimicking diet cycles versus a Mediterranean diet and cardiometabolic risk in overweight and obese hypertensive subjects: a randomized clinical trial · NPJ Metabolic Health and Disease, 2023
- Nutrition Care for Poorly Nourished Outpatients Reduces Resource Use and Lowers Costs · Journal of Primary Care & Community Health, 2021
- Glucagon-Like Peptide Receptor-1 Agonists Used for Medically-Supervised Weight Loss in Patients With Hip and Knee Osteoarthritis: Critical Considerations for the Arthroplasty Surgeon · Arthroplasty Today, 2024
- Super-Obesity is Associated With an Increased Risk of Complications Following Primary Total Knee Arthroplasty · Journal of Arthroplasty, 2024
Notable Collaborators
- Valter Longo, PhD · Fasting-mimicking diet clinical trials in cardiometabolic health and biological age
- Nathanael Heckmann, MD · GLP-1 receptor agonist use and perioperative risk in arthroplasty patients
Other specialists at Lifeforce
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