YNHHS News Releases

Released April 26, 2007

Emergency and medical toxicology specialist joins System staff

NEW HAVEN – Anthony J. Tomassoni, M.D., of Cape Elizabeth, Maine, has joined the staff of Yale New Haven Health System as medical director of the office of emergency preparedness/Yale New Haven Center for Emergency Preparedness and Disaster Response. His primary focus is on disaster medicine.

Dr. Tomassoni assumes his new position at Yale New Haven Health, having served as the medical director of the Southern Maine Regional Resource Center for Emergency Preparedness.

With more than two decades of distinguished academic, clinical and administrative achievements to his credit, Dr. Tomassoni has a special interest in disaster training and planning, and toxicology antidote preparedness.

Dr. Tomassoni, who also serves as an attending physician in the emergency department at Yale-New Haven Hospital, is an assistant professor of emergency medicine at Yale School of Medicine.

Since 1995, Dr. Tomassoni has served as medical team manager of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Urban Search and Rescue Massachusetts Task Force 1, a search and rescue team for urban disasters. Dr. Tomassoni was one of the first FEMA respondents to the World Trade Center disaster on September 11, 2001. Prior to his position at YNHH and Yale New Haven Health, Dr. Tomassoni served as director, then medical director, of the Northern New England Poison Center, a public-private partnership now serving the poison information, toxicology critical care information and educational needs of healthcare providers and residents of Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont. He was a lead advocate for the establishment of a Maine state emergency medical response team and, in conjunction with the state’s trauma centers and the Maine Bureau of Health, created three hospital-based regional resource centers to coordinate emergency care.

“We are thrilled to have Dr. Tomassoni on board at Yale New Haven Health,” said Christopher Cannon, M.S.N., M.P.H., fellow, American College of Healthcare Executives and national director of the Yale New Haven Center for Emergency Preparedness and Disaster Response. “His extensive work in the area of emergency medicine and disaster response has rendered him an expert in the field.”

Dr. Tomassoni received his undergraduate and master’s degrees from Fairleigh Dickinson University and his medical degree from University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey Medical School. He did his post-graduate training at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center in emergency medicine and toxicology.

Dr. Tomassoni and his wife, Laurel, have two children. The family will relocate to Connecticut at the end of the school year.

The Yale New Haven Health System is comprised of Bridgeport, Greenwich, and Yale-New Haven Hospitals. Yale New Haven Health offers patients a full range of health care services of the highest quality, from primary care to the most complex care available anywhere in the world.

The Yale New Haven Center for Emergency Preparedness and Disaster Response is a national leader in healthcare emergency preparedness and disaster response. Yale New Haven’s Center has been recognized by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as a Center for Public Health Preparedness (CPHP) – the only health system-based and health care delivery-focused CPHP in the United States.