Joshua Safer, MD, an internationally renowned clinical endocrinologist and authority on transgender medicine, has joined the Mount Sinai Health System as executive director of the Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery (CTMS), the first and only center in New York — and one of a few pioneers nationwide — to provide transgender patients with a comprehensive and integrated system of care.
Safer, the Center’s first executive director, will also serve as a senior faculty member at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. “There is a massive gap in transgender medical care that needs to be filled,” Safer says. “The Mount Sinai center will serve as a model of medical care delivery for transgender and gender non-conforming individuals. Mount Sinai’s position as a leading academic medical center will be leveraged to develop programs to train the next generation of physicians in transgender health care.”
In response to the growing need for treatment for transgender individuals, Mount Sinai launched the nation’s first transgender surgery and psychiatric medical fellowships in 2017. Little evidence-based data exist to guide transgender health care decisions. Safer’s arrival will provide the opportunity for Mount Sinai to establish scientific research iniatives to advance the field.
Safer was most recently the founding medical director of the Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery at Boston Medical Center and Boston University School of Medicine. He earned his medical degree from the University of Wisconsin and completed his internal medicine residency at Mount Sinai Beth Israel and his endocrinology fellowship at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston.
Safer was a co-author of the Endocrine Society guidelines for the medical care of transgender patients and serves on the Endocrine News Editorial Advisory Board.
President of the United States Professional Association for Transgender Health (USPATH) and the steering committee co-chair of the international transgender research consortium, TransNet, Safer also serves on the Global Education Initiative committee for the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), on the Standards of Care revision committee for WPATH, and as a scientific co-chair for WPATH’s international meeting. In addition, he is a past president of the Association of Specialty Professors, the umbrella organization for leaders in internal medicine subspecialty education, and a former secretary-treasurer of the national endocrinology program director organization, the Association of Program Directors in Endocrinology and Metabolism (APDEM).
Safer’s research focus is on demonstrating the health and quality of life benefits of increased access to care for transgender patients. His current and past sources of funding support include the National Institutes of Health and a number of private foundations.
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