Gail D’Onofrio, MD, MS, is an emergency medicine and addiction medicine specialist who is internationally known for her work in alcohol and other substance use disorders, and in gender variations in women with ischemic heart disease. She is the former physician-in-chief of emergency services at Yale New Haven Hospital and was the inaugural chair of the Department of Emergency Medicine at Yale School of Medicine.
Dr. D’Onofrio’s goals have always been to provide quality medical care for the wide range of people who come through the emergency department (ED) doors, whether that means resuscitating and stabilizing critically ill or injured patients, or assessing and treating nonemergent illness or injuries.
“The ED offers access to care for all—all day, all night, every day,” she says. “Our goal Is to treat the presenting problem and make connections to any services or resources our patients might need, whether they have an acute illness or injury, an addiction, or exacerbation of chronic disease such as diabetes or hypertension.”
In addition to her role as Albert E. Kent professor of emergency medicine at Yale School of Medicine, Dr. D’Onofrio holds professorships in chronic disease epidemiology in Yale School of Public Health, and in internal medicine (core faculty in addiction).
For the past 30 years she has developed and tested interventions for alcohol, opioids, and other substance use disorders, serving as the principal investigator (PI) on several large National Institutes of Health (NIH), Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMSHA), and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) studies. Her research demonstrating that ED-initiated buprenorphine increases engagement in addiction treatment for people with opioid use disorder changed clinical practice.
Dr. D’Onofrio is also a founding member of the Board of Addiction Medicine, which is now recognized by the American Board of Medical Specialties as a specialty and subspecialty through Preventive Medicine. She has worked on the state and national levels and with multiple agencies to change policies and introduce interventions to combat the opioid crisis.
