^{Eric Leonard Weiss (born January 23, 1958) is an American emergency physician, travel and wilderness medicine specialist, and medical educator. He is the founder and chief executive of The Village Doctor, a concierge family healthcare practice in Woodside, California, and an associate clinical professor of surgery (emergency medicine) at the Stanford University School of Medicine[1]. Over his career he has helped establish travel and airport medicine services in the San Francisco Bay Area, directed aeromedical transport and emergency medical services at Stanford, and served as an author, editor, and frequent media commentator on travel, tropical, and wilderness medicine. As a child he appeared in the 1968 film Petulia.[2]}

Weiss was born on January 23, 1958. As a child actor, he played the role of Michael in Richard Lester's 1968 romantic drama film Petulia, which starred Julie Christie and George C. Scott and was filmed on location in San Francisco.^[1] He attended Sir Francis Drake High School in San Anselmo, California (renamed Archie Williams High School in 2021), graduating in the class of 1976, and is listed among the school's notable alumni.^[2]

He earned a Bachelor of Science degree cum laude in biological sciences from Stanford University in 1980, where he also completed the departmental honors program in biological sciences.^[4] He received his Doctor of Medicine from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine in 1984, where he was awarded the Tucker Scholarship for Academic Medicine (1982) and elected to the Sutro Society for Scientific Research (1984).^[4] In 1989 he completed a Diploma in Tropical Medicine and Hygiene at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.^[4]

Weiss completed an internship in internal medicine at the UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles in 1985–1986, followed by a residency in emergency medicine there from 1986 to 1989. He served as chief resident in emergency medicine at UCLA from 1989 to 1990, and completed the UCLA MedStar flight physician training program in 1987.^[4] He became a diplomate of the National Board of Medical Examiners in 1986 and a diplomate of the American Board of Emergency Medicine in 1992.^[4]

Weiss joined the Stanford University School of Medicine in 1991 as an assistant professor in the Department of Surgery's Division of Emergency Medicine.^[4] In 1992 he founded and directed the Stanford Travel Medicine Service. He later served as associate chief of emergency medicine (1997–2000) and held faculty appointments in emergency medicine through the 2000s; since 2009 he has been an associate clinical professor of surgery (emergency medicine) at Stanford.^[3]

From 1998 to 2005 Weiss directed Emergency Medical Services at Stanford University Hospital and served as medical director of its Life Flight aeromedical transport program.^[4] He was director of medical education for the Division of Emergency Medicine from 1993 to 1995 and directed numerous Stanford courses in travel, wilderness, and global health, including the Medicine 225 (Travel Medicine and International Health) and Medicine 261 global health course sequences. Since 1998 he has served as medical director of the Stanford Alumni Association Travel/Study Program, accompanying alumni expeditions worldwide as trip physician.^[4]

From 1995 to 1997, Weiss was chief medical officer of the SFO Medical Service at San Francisco International Airport and chief of the Division of Airport Medicine at UCSF, where he was also an assistant clinical professor of medicine.^[4] He directed travel medicine at Stanford's Vaden Student Health Service from 1999 to 2005 and served as medical advisor to Shoreland, Incorporated (1998–1999) and as chief medical officer of MedicinePlanet, Inc. (1999–2001).^[4]

Weiss served as medical director of the Palo Alto Fire Department (1994–1999) and of the Woodside Fire Department (2000–2010), and held medical advisory roles with the San Mateo County Paramedic Association and county EMS agencies in San Mateo and Santa Clara counties. He has served on the board of the Woodside Fire Foundation since 2011.^[4]

In 2004 Weiss founded The Village Doctor, a concierge family healthcare practice in Woodside, California, where he serves as founder and chief executive officer.^[4] He has been founder and chief editor of the practice's monthly TVD Newsletter since 2004, and founded and edited a weekly coronavirus news bulletin, CV News, from 2020 to 2022. From 2013 to 2014 he served as chief medical editor for General Electric's HealthLine.^[4]

Weiss has authored peer-reviewed journal articles, book chapters, and review pieces in travel, tropical, wilderness, and emergency medicine. His early research included a prospective study of physician exposure to ionizing radiation during trauma resuscitation, published in Annals of Emergency Medicine in 1990.^[5] He contributed the "Expedition Medicine" chapter to multiple editions of the textbook Travel Medicine (Mosby) and a chapter on wilderness-acquired zoonoses to Paul Auerbach's Wilderness Medicine.^[4] He has served on the editorial boards of eMedicine and the International Travel Health Guide, and as a manuscript reviewer for the Journal of Travel Medicine, the journal of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, and the Journal of Wilderness Medicine.^[4]

Weiss has been a frequent media commentator on travel, environmental, and public-health topics, appearing on outlets including MSNBC, CNN Moneyline, KGO, and KTVU, and in print outlets such as the Los Angeles Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, on subjects ranging from West Nile virus and Lyme disease to bioterrorism preparedness and concierge medicine.^[4] In 1997 he served as a travel and tropical medicine consultant for the Warner Brothers television series ER. He has served on travel medicine and vaccine advisory boards for GlaxoSmithKline and Merck.^[4]

Weiss has provided medical support for athletic, expedition, and disaster settings. He served as a flight and rescue physician with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department air rescue unit (1990) and as consulting physician for a 1993 West Ridge expedition on K2 in the Himalayas.^[4] He provided medical support at the 1988 United States Presidential Debates and the 1994 World Cup soccer matches at Stanford Stadium, and worked with the UCLA mutual-aid response team following the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. He has held international clinical positions including with the Royal Flying Doctor Service in Cairns, Australia (1985) and the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in London (1989).^[4]

Weiss is a Fellow of the American College of Emergency Physicians (1993) and holds a Certificate of Knowledge in Tropical Medicine and Traveler's Health from the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (1998).^[4] He was elected a Fellow of the World Association of International Studies in 2003 and a National Fellow of The Explorers Club in 2024. His professional memberships include the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, the International Society for Travel Medicine, and the Wilderness Medical Society.^[4]

Weiss is married and has four children. He speaks German and Spanish, and is a certified diving instructor.^[4]