Dr. Jonathan Giftos is the Chief of Ambulatory Care and the Chief Quality Officer at NYC Health + Hospitals / Woodhull. He is also a Clinical Associate Professor of Medicine at NYU Grossman School of Medicine.
Previously, he served as the Assistant Commissioner of the Bureau of Alcohol & Drug Use: Prevention, Care and Treatment at the NYC Department of Health & Mental Hygiene, where he led the city's strategic investments to reduce drug related harms.
Prior to his work in city government, Dr. Giftos served as the Medical Director for Addiction Medicine & Drug User Health at Project Renewal, a large housing and integrated health provider in NYC. In this role, he developed clinical services for people who use drugs in Project Renewal's crisis, shelter, supportive housing and affordable housing spaces. He also worked to expand harm reduction services, while supervising care for people who use drugs in non-licensed spaces, supporting primary care doctors in their article 28 clinics, and serving as medical director for Project Renewal's OASAS licensed programs, which include medically supervised withdrawal, outpatient and residential treatment settings.
From 2016 to 2020, Dr. Giftos served as the Clinical Director of Substance Use Treatment for the Division of Correctional Health Services at Rikers Island, where he oversaw diversion, harm reduction, treatment and reentry services for incarcerated patients with substance use disorders. He was also the medical director of the Key Extended Entry Program (KEEP), the nation's oldest and largest jail-based OTP on Rikers Island.
Prior to medical school, Dr. Giftos lived and taught first-grade in Honduras, served as an immigration social worker in Camden, NJ and worked at Abraham House, an alternative to incarceration residence in the South Bronx. A long-time photographer, he continues to see the camera as both a creative outlet and as a powerful tool for social change. He lives with his wife and two sons in Brooklyn.