Matthew Spitzer Email & Phone Number

An ethics of refusal to accept care that is “less than” or “good enough”; to go to where need is; to be reflective and creative in practice to see what is unique in individual patients as well as what is preserved across cultures and communities: these are core principles that have guided Matthew Spitzer, a family physician, in shaping and adapting his work with underserved and vulnerable populations both at home and abroad. Matt graduated Yale with a BA in Philosophy, was elected to AOA at Cornell and received the George H. Reader Award for a paper on the benefits of birth centers and nurse-midwifery over standard obstetric care of childbirth. He completed his residency training at UCSF / San Franciso General Hospital in Family and Community Medicine in 1998. Matt joined Medecins Sans Frontieres / Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in 1999, and went into the field to establish primary care services in Khampa, central Tibet. He was Field Coordinator in Sierra Leone for Moyamba hospital and Taiama refugee camp, fighting malaria and severe malnutrition, led an exploration of the medical needs of asylum seekers in INS detention, and in Cambodia initiated MSF-France's response to epidemic dengue. He was elected to the board of MSF-USA in 2006, and served as President from 2008-12, taking part in negotiations with US government and military forces, pushing MSF governance reform to enable more equitable and accessible participation and leadership, and overseeing MSF medical and financial activities. Domestically, he worked for 10 years in San Francisco at the St. Anthony Free Clinic and its affiliated drug rehabilitation program. He has worked in rural ERs and urban community-based clinics, in correctional health at San Quentin and Rikers Island, and taught at UCSF, UC-Berkeley, and Columbia. Currently he works in urgent care, largely in central Brooklyn neighborhoods Bed-Stuy, Crown Heights, East Flatbush, where the continuing effects of the covid epidemic have significantly worsened health care access and overall health of communities. Matt is trained in medical acupuncture, studied tropical medicine and hygiene at the London School, and figure drawing with Michael Markowitz at the 23rd St. Gallery. He has recently been developing a project about an illegal cross-border MSF mission into Afghanistan in 1986, based on the graphic novel The Photographer.