Assistant Secretary for Health Affairs & Chief Medical Officer
Kathryn Brinsfield, M.D., M.P.H. serves as the Assistant Secretary for Health Affairs and Chief Medical Officer for the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Office of Health Affairs (OHA). She served as the Acting Assistant Secretary in OHA and the Acting Chief Medical Officer for DHS from 2013 to February 2015 and was detailed to the National Security Staff as the Director of Medical Preparedness Policy from 2012 to 2013. She began working at DHS in July 2008 and previously served as Director of the Division of Workforce Health and Medical Support within OHA. Before joining DHS, Dr. Brinsfield worked for various organizations, including Massachusetts Homeland Security Boston Emergency Services (EMS), Boston Metropolitan Medical Response System, and the del Valle Emergency Preparedness Training Institute.
Dr. Brinsfield left Boston as an associate professor at the Boston University Schools of Medicine and Public Health with thirteen years of experience as an attending physician at Boston City Hospital/ Boston Medical Center. She graduated with honors from Brown University and received her M.D. from Tufts School of Medicine, and her M.P.H. from Boston University. She completed her residency in Emergency Medicine at Cook County Hospital in Chicago, and her EMS fellowship at Boston EMS. She worked for Boston EMS as director of research, training and quality improvements, medical director for special operations, and associate medical director. She chaired the American College of Emergency Physician’s Disaster Committee, co-chaired the Massachusetts State Surge Committee, assisted in the creation of the Massachusetts Alternate Standards of Care Committee, and was the Commander of the Massachusetts -1 Disaster Medical Assistance Team and a Supervisory Medical Officer for the International Medical and Surgical Response Team, which responded to the Sept. 11 attacks.