Dori B. Reissman, MD, MA, MPH
Dori B. Reissman, MD, MA, MPH
RADM (Ret), USPHS
Senior Scientist, Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress
Adjunct Professor of Psychiatry, School of Medicine
Uniformed Services University
Dr. Dori B. Reissman is a retired Rear Admiral and Assistant Surgeon General in the U.S. Public Health Service. She recently retired from federal executive service as the Associate Administrator for the World Trade Center Health Program at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In that role, Dr. Reissman oversaw all management, administrative, scientific, and clinical services provided to the >125,000 enrolled program members harmed by the U.S. terror attacks on September 11, 2001. Dr. Reissman led and coordinated a myriad of scientific activities supporting a “research-to-care” philosophical paradigm to guide programmatic planning, including a robust extramural research portfolio and exposure registry to characterize exposure-linkage for adverse health effects, biomarkers and mechanisms of action to facilitate care strategies, for research translation and dissemination, and to identify emerging health impacts through surveillance.
Dr Reissman has been a faculty member for the USU Dept. of Psychiatry for over a decade, providing pathways to leverage the strengths of the Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress with CDC, leading to the creation of the CDC’s Responder Resilience Program during the agency’s response to the 2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean. This was followed by a joint CDC/USU research project with the Florida Dept. of Health to assess the workforce impact of a devastating hurricane season.
Dr Reissman was commissioned within the U.S. Public Health Service in 1997 through the CDC Epidemic Intelligence Service, beginning her service within CDC’s National Center for Environmental Health, researching and lecturing on childhood lead poisoning both domestically and internationally. She participated in a variety of environmental hazard investigations, including arsenic contamination of drinking water, chemical contamination of toothbrushes in a Tribal Head Start program, and allergic reactions due to consumption of bioengineered corn. Dr Reissman served in numerous capacities in CDC’s Bioterrorism Preparedness and Response Program, and in emergency operations throughout the 9/11 terror and 2001 anthrax spore attacks. She joined CDC’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control as an expert in disaster mental and behavioral health for policy and program. She has deployed for many disasters and worked to integrate workforce resilience strategies within incident command structures at CDC and for community-based public health protection. Dr. Reissman is a physician (Albert Einstein Coll. Med) with advanced training in psychiatry (clinical residency, Hackensack Medical Center and St. Vincents Hospital and Med Ctr of NY), occupational medicine and public health (MPH and clinical residency, Univ. of IL), and toxicology (MA, Columbia Univ).