Dr. Kimberly Vesco is a board-certified, practicing obstetrician-gynecologist with Kaiser Permanente Northwest (KNPW) whose clinical work has strongly influenced her research on women’s health issues.

Along with CHR Senior Investigator Victor Stevens, Dr. Vesco led the Healthy Moms Study, a randomized trial of a group-based diet and lifestyle weight management program for pregnant women. That led to two studies on which she is the primary investigator, one examining the relationship between visceral and liver fat stores in pregnancy and metabolic changes, placental function, and fetal growth, and the other a randomized trial of a preconception intervention for overweight and obese women planning pregnancies.

Dr. Vesco is a co-investigator on a trial testing two screening strategies for gestational diabetes mellitus among more than 17,500 pregnant women and their babies to determine how diagnosis and treatment in routine clinical care affect complications for the baby and mother. She is the lead investigator on a trial at KPNW that aims to improve the diagnosis and management of vulvovaginal atrophy and a co-investigator on the Study of Osteoporotic Fractures.

She has worked extensively with the Oregon Evidence-based Practice Center, conducting systematic evidence reviews for the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force on topics including management of menopausal symptoms, screening for gestational diabetes mellitus, and cervical cancer screening.

Dr. Vesco joined the Permanente Medical Group in 2001 after earning her medical degree from the University of California, San Diego, School of Medicine. She trained in obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Utah, Salt Lake City, and completed a women’s health fellowship and an MPH degree with a focus in epidemiology and biostatistics at Oregon Health & Science University.