Dr. Yates earned his medical degree at the Yale School of Medicine and completed a residency in family medicine at Middlesex Hospital in Connecticut. He earned a diploma in tropical medicine and hygiene from the Gorgas Memorial Institute in Lima, Peru, and worked for 1 ½ years at the CIWEC Clinic Travel Medicine Center in Kathmandu, Nepal, a clinic known for the treatment of tropical infections as well as altitude illness. He also spent three months as a CDC/WHO consultant for the polio eradication program in Ghana, West Africa. He has been with Hawaii Permanente Medical Group for the past 20 years, where he serves as medical director for both the Travel & Tropical Medicine service, and the Kaiser Home Hospice program.