Meet our Board Chair

Ariel Hurtado was born and raised in Hollister, California. He was born into a family of five siblings. His parents were agricultural workers who stressed hard work and firmly believed in the American dream. He attended the local schools where he was active in sports, community and his church. After high school, he attended UC Berkeley with the goal of going to medical school. He double majored in Psychology and Spanish while completing his premedical requirements. He punctuated his time in college with a year of study in Spain and multiple undergraduate medical research projects revolving around pediatric teratogens. After some time in the business world, he enrolled in medical school at the University of Michigan. He continued his student recruitment efforts thereby serving on the medical school admissions committee and continuing medical research projects in pediatric craniosynostosis.

 

After living in Michigan, he returned to sunny California to complete his surgical internship at the University of California at San Francisco. He then spent a year working for the Northern California Transplant Bank harvesting organs and tissues for transplant. It was during this time that he met and married his lovely wife, Megan. Together, they moved to Long Beach, California, where he started his anesthesia residency at the University of California at Irvine. Long hours of residency and overnight call were juggled with the demands of starting a young family. During residency, Dr. Hurtado became interested in the burgeoning new field of ultrasound guided regional anesthesia. After graduation, he stayed an additional year as an anesthesiology instructor for new doctors while completing a fellowship in Regional Anesthesia and Acute Pain Management.

 

Dr. Hurtado returned to his roots after his medical residency and fellowship to serve the community at the hospital where he was born. Since returning to Hollister, he has focused on improving healthcare delivery by devoting himself to improving medical services in San Benito County. He modernized anesthesiology services and served in multiple leadership positions including as chairman of the Surgery Department. He was elected to represent his community district as Vice President of the Hospital Board where he was instrumental in guiding hospital decisions for four years. He continued his own medical education and earned three board certifications in Anesthesiology, Pediatric Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine. He continued to practice hospital-based anesthesiology while starting up his own independent interventional pain management practice, Warrior Wellness, that now has two locations and employs another clinician.

 

As his three children approached their teenage years, he became acutely aware of the changing nature of education and professional achievement. Drawing on his years of education and medical apprenticeship, he became determined to help his community by making entry into the middle class a reality. His previous work in the hospital setting at the management level demonstrated to him that there are multiple, unfilled, and high- paying medical careers available to students with the proper exposure and training.

Working with a great team of successful like-minded individuals with diverse backgrounds led to the creation of the Education Board of California. Their goal is to put students on the path to financial freedom and independence so that they can reinvest in their communities.

 

An avid athlete, Dr. Hurtado likes to spend his time with his family in outdoor activities of all kinds and enjoys long distance running, martial arts and powerlifting. His current academic interests include management of sports injuries, physical optimization and injury rehabilitation.