Elinore F. McCance-Katz, MD, PhD

Elinore McCance-Katz, MD, PhD is the first Assistant Secretary for Mental Health and Substance Use and leads the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Dr. McCance-Katz obtained her PhD from Yale University with a specialty in Infectious Disease Epidemiology and is a graduate of the University of Connecticut School of Medicine. She is board certified in General Psychiatry and in Addiction Psychiatry and is a Distinguished Fellow of the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry with more than 25 years as a clinician, teacher and clinical researcher. Most recently she served as the Chief Medical Officer for the Rhode Island Department of Behavioral Healthcare, Developmental Disabilities and Hospitals and as the Chief Medical Officer for the Eleanor Slater Hospital system. She was also Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior at Brown University. Previously, she served as the first Chief Medical Officer for the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). Prior to coming to SAMHSA, she served at the University of California, San Francisco as a Professor of Psychiatry, as the Medical Director for the California Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs, and as the Medical Director of SAMHSA’s Clinical Support Systems for Buprenorphine (PCSS-B) and Opioids (PCSS-O).